ROMTHEANGL 
OF  SEVENTEEN 


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XI 

EDEN  PHILLPOTTS 


FROM  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 


FROM  THE  ANGLE 
OF  SEVENTEEN 


BY 
EDEN    PHILLPOTTS 

AUTHOK  OP 
"WIDECOMBE  FAIR,"    "THE  LOVERS,"  ETC. 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,   BROWN,   AND   COMPANY 

1914 


Copyright,  1912, 
Bt  Little,  Brown,  and   Company. 

All  rights  reserved 


^rintna 
B.  J.  Paukbill  &  Co.,  Boston,  U.S.A- 


I.TBRARY 

univehsity  of  California 

santa  barbara 


TO 

HUGHES    MASSIE 

IN    ALL    FRIENDSHIP 


FROM    THE   ANGLE 
OF  SEVENTEEN 


WHEN  the  Doctor  sent  for  me  to 
his  study,  I  hoped  it  was  about 
the  fireworks,  because  I  was 
head  boy  that  term,  and,  in  a  great  posi- 
tion hke  that,  there  were  advantages  to 
make  up  for  the  anxiety.  You  bossed  the 
fireworks  on  the  fifth  of  November  and 
many  other  such-like  things. 

But  the  Doctor  had  nothing  to  say 
about  fireworks.  In  fact,  a  critical  mo- 
ment had  come  in  my  life:  I  was  to  leave. 
"  Sit  down,  Corkey,"  said  the  Doctor; 
and  that  in  itself  was  a  startler,  because 
he  never  asked  anybody  to  sit  down  ex- 
cept parents  or  guardians. 


2  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

I  sat  and  he  looked  at  me  with  a  friendly 
and  regretful  expression,  the  same  as  he  did 
when  he  had  to  tell  me  my  father  was 
dead. 

"  Corkey,"  he  began,  "  this  morning 
brings  a  missive  from  your  maternal  aunt, 
]\Iiss  Augusta  Medwin.  As  you  know,  she 
is  your  trustee  until  you  come  of  age,  four 
years  hence.  Your  Aunt  Augusta,  mind- 
ful that  the  time  was  at  hand  when  you 
would  be  called  to  take  your  place  in  the 
ranks  of  action,  has  for  some  time  been  on 
the  lookout  for  you;  and  to-day  I  learn 
that  her  efforts  have  been  crowned  with 
success.  It  is  my  custom  to  require  a 
term's  notice;  but  such  is  my  regard  for 
your  Aunt  Augusta  that  I  have  decided  to 
waive  that  rule  in  your  case.  A  clerkship 
in  London  has  been  secured  for  you  —  a 
nomination  to  the  staff  of  that  famous  in- 
stitution, the  Apollo  Fire  Office.  The 
necessary  examination,  to  one  who  has 
risen  to  be  head  boy  of  Merivale,  should 


OF  SEVENTEEN  3 

prove  but  a  trifle.  And  yet,  since  nothing 
can  be  left  to  chance,  we  must  see  that  you 
are  guarded  at  all  points.  In  a  fortnight, 
Corkey  Major,  you  will  be  required  to  show 
that  your  mathematics  are  sound,  your 
knowledge  of  grammatical  construction 
above  suspicion,  and  your  general  average 
of  intellectual  attainment  all  that  the  world 
of  business  —  the  great  industrial  centers  of 
finance  —  have  a  right  to  demand  from 
their  neophytes.  I  do  not  fear  for  you:  the 
appointment  and  its  requirements  are  not 
such  as  to  demand  a  standard  of  accom- 
plishment beyond  your  powers;  but,  at 
the  same  time,  remember  that  this  modest 
beginning  may  lead  the  way  to  name  and 
fame.  The  first  step  can  never  be  too  hum- 
ble if  we  look  upward  to  the  next.  I,  my- 
self, as  all  the  world  knows,  was  once  en- 
gaged in  the  avocation  of  a  bookseller's 
assistant.  I  have  already  conferred  with 
Mr.  Brown  as  to  your  mathematical  at- 
tainments, and,  making  due  allowance  for 


4  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

his  generous  ardour  to  all  that  pertains  to 
the  First  Form,  I  have  no  doubt  with  him 
that  you  will  satisfy  your  examiners.  Your 
handwriting,  however,  must  be  the  subject 
of  anxious  thought,  and,  as  you  will  be 
called  upon  in  the  course  of  the  examina- 
tion to  write  a  brief  essay  on  any  subject 
that  may  occur  to  the  examining  authori- 
ties, I  trust  that  you  will  be  at  pains  to 
state  your  views  in  careful  caligraphy. 
Again,  if  a  word  arises  to  your  mind  con- 
cerning the  spelling  of  which  you  feel 
doubtful,  discard  it  at  once  and  strive  to 
find  another  that  will  meet  the  case. 
Spelling,  I  have  reason  to  know,  is  not  a 
strong  point  with  you." 

The  Doctor  sighed  and  continued. 

"  I  am  sorry  to  lose  you,"  he  said.  "  You 
have  been  a  reasonably  good  and  indus- 
trious boy.  Your  faults  were  those  of 
youth.  You  go  into  the  world  armed,  I 
think,  at  all  points.  Be  modest,  patient, 
and     good-tempered;     and     choose     high- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  5 

minded  friends.  I  may  add,  for  your  en- 
couragement, that  you  will  receive  emolu- 
ment from  the  outset  of  your  official  labours. 
The  salary  is  fifty  pounds  a  year,  and  you 
will  work  daily  from  ten  o'clock  until  four. 
On  Saturdays  they  pursue  our  own  scho- 
lastic custom  and  give  their  officials  a  half- 
holiday.  Your  vacation,  however,  is  of  a 
trivial  character.  The  world  is  a  task- 
master, not  a  schoolmaster.  One  fortnight 
a  year  will  be  all  the  holiday  permitted; 
and  since  you  enter  the  establishment  at 
the  bottom,  you  must  be  prepared  to  enjoy 
this  relaxation  at  any  month  in  the  year 
most  convenient  to  your  superiors.  Should 
time  and  chance  allow  of  it,  Corkey  Major, 
I  may  tell  you  that  it  will  give  me  per- 
sonal pleasure  to  see  you  on  some  occasion 
of  this  annual  vacation  —  as  a  guest.  Your 
two  brothers  continue  with  us  until  in  their 
turn  they  pass  out  into  the  world  from  the 
little  haven  of  Merivale." 

The  idea  of  Merivale  as  a  haven  pleased 


6  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

the  Doctor.  I  hoped  he  had  finished,  but 
he  went  off  again. 

"  Yes,  the  simile  is  just.  You  come  here 
empty  and  depart  on  your  voyage  laden. 
You  are  loaded  according  to  your  accom- 
modation —  some  more,  some  less ;  and  I, 
the  harbour-master  —  however,  we  will  not 
push  the  image,  for,  to  be  frank,  I  am  not 
sure  as  to  what  exactly  pertains  to  a  har- 
bour-master's duties  in  respect  of  cargo. 
To  return,  Mr.  Brown  will  see  you  in  his 
study  after  morning  school  with  a  view  to 
some  special  lessons  in  arithmetic.  He  in- 
clines to  the  opinion  that  the  Rule  of  Three 
should  prove  a  tower  of  strength,  and  no 
doubt  he  is  right.     You  may  go." 

He  waved  his  hand  and  I  got  up.  One 
thing  had  stuck  exceedingly  fast  in  my 
mind  and  now,  though  I  did  not  mean  to 
mention  it  in  particular,  it  came  out. 

"  Am  I  really  worth  fifty  pounds  a  year 
to  anybody,  sir? " 

The  Doctor  smiled. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  7 

"  A  natural  question,  Corkey,  and  I 
think  no  worse  of  you  for  having  asked  it. 
The  magnitude  of  the  sum  may  reasonably 
puzzle  a  lad  who  as  yet  cannot  appreciate 
the  value  of  money.  This,  however,  is  no 
time  to  enter  upon  the  complicated  question 
of  supply  and  demand.  It  will  be  sufficient 
for  you  to  know  that  the  Managers  of  the 
Apollo  Fire  Office  are  in  reasonable  hopes 
of  getting  their  money's  worth  —  to  speak 
colloquially.  For  my  part,  when  I  think 
upon  your  ten  years  of  steady  work  at 
Merivale,  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying 
the  salary  is  not  extravagant.  Let  it  be 
your  part  to  administer  it  with  prudence 
and  swiftly  to  convince  those  set  in  author- 
ity over  you  that  you  are  worth  more  than 
that  annual  sum  rather  than  less." 

I  cleared  out  and  told  the  chaps,  and 
they  were  all  fearfully  interested,  especially 
Morgan,  because  when  I  left  Morgan 
would  become  the  head  of  the  school.  He 
turned  a  sort  of  dirty-drab  green  when  he 


8  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

heard  that  I  was  gomg;  and  first  I  thought 
it  was  sorrow  for  me,  and  then  I  found  it 
was  funk  for  himself.  He  didn't  care  a 
button  about  losing  me;  but  he  felt  that  to 
be  lifted  up  all  of  a  sudden  to  the  top  was 
almost  too  much. 

"  I  feel  like  the  Pope  felt  when  he  found 
he  was  going  to  be  elected,"  he  said.  "  Only 
it 's  far  worse  for  me  than  him,  because  he 
need  n't  have  entered  the  competition  for 
Pope,  I  suppose,  if  he  did  n't  want ;  but,  in 
my  case,  the  thing  is  a  sort  of  law  of  na- 
ture, and  I  've  got  to  be  head  boy." 

"  There  are  the  advantages,"  I  said. 
But  he  could  only  see  the  responsibilities. 
He  wasn't  pretending:  he  really  hated 
the  idea  —  for  the  moment. 

I  told  my  chum.  Frost,  too;  and  I  told 
him  that  I  'd  asked  the  Doctor  whether  I 
was  worth  fifty  pounds  a  year  to  anybody. 

"  If  he  'd  been  straight,"  said  Frost, 
"  he  'd  have  told  you  that  you  've  been 
worth  fifty  pounds  a  year  to  him,  anyway 


OF  SEVENTEEN  9 

—  for  countless  years ;  because  you  came 
here  almost  as  soon  as  you  were  born,  and 
your  brothers,  too." 

It  was  a  great  upheaval,  like  things  al- 
ways seem  to  be  when  they  happen,  how- 
ever much  you  expect  them.  Of  course 
I  knew  I  had  to  go  sometime,  and  was 
thankful  to  think  so,  and  full  of  ambitions 
for  grown-up  life;  but  now  that  the  mo- 
ment had  actually  come,  I  was  n't  par- 
ticularly keen  about  it.  Especially  as  I 
should  miss  the  fireworks  and  lose  the 
various  prizes  I  was  a  snip  for,  if  I  'd 
stopped  till  Christmas.  I  rather  wished 
my  Aunt  Augusta  had  n't  been  so  busy, 
and  had  left  my  career  alone,  at  any  rate 
until  after  the  Christmas  holidays. 

Of  course  my  going  was  a  godsend  to 
various  other  chaps  and,  though  they  re- 
gretted it  in  a  way,  especially  the  footer 
eleven,  such  a  lot  of  things  were  always 
happening  from  day  to  day  at  Merivale 
that  there  was  no  time  really  to  mourn. 


10     THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

One  or  two  wanted  to  club  up  and  give  me 
a  present,  but  it  didn't  come  to  reality; 
though  of  course  they  were  frightfully 
sorr}'^  I  was  going,  when  they  had  time  to 
think  about  it.  They  were,  naturally,  very 
keen  over  the  various  things  that  I  left  be- 
hind; but  of  course  these  were  all  handed 
over  to  my  brothers. 

Then  the  rather  solemn  moment  came 
when  a  cab  arrived  for  me  and  I  went. 
But  everybody  was  in  class  at  the  time  and 
nobody  missed  me.  In  fact,  it  was  n't  what 
you  might  call  really  solemn  to  anybody 
but  myself. 


II 


So  I  went  to  London,  where,  of  course, 
I  had  always  meant  to  go  sooner  or 
later.  I  had  heard  and  read  a  great 
deal  about  this  place,  but  had  no  idea  that 
it  was  so  remarkable  as  it  really  is.  Per- 
haps the  most  extraordinary  of  all  things 
in  London  is  passing  millions  of  people 
every  day  of  your  life  and  not  knowing  a 
single  one.  My  Aunt  Augusta  met  me  at 
Paddington,  and  we  drove  to  her  home, 
where  I  was  to  stop  for  the  time  being. 
Her  name  was  Miss  Augusta  Medwin,  and 
she  lived  in  a  place  called  Cornwall  Resi- 
dences and  was  an  R.B.A.  It  was  a  huge 
house  divided  into  flats,  and  her  flat  was 
the  top  one  of  all.  She  was  an  artist,  and 
R.B.A.  stands  for  Royal  British  Artist. 
She  had  a  little  place  leading  out  of  her 
flat  on  to  the  roof  of  the  building.     This 


12  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

was  built  specially  for  her.  It  looked  out 
on  to  the  whole  of  the  top  of  London  and 
was  a  studio.  The  JNIetropolitan  Railway 
had  a  yard  down  below,  where  the  engines 
got  up  steam  before  going  to  work  in  the 
mornings.  It  was,  of  course,  a  far  more 
interesting  spot  than  any  I  had  ever  yet 
met  with.  I  had  a  little  room  in  the  flat, 
and  m}^  aunt  had  made  it  very  nice  and 
comfortable.  But  the  engines  always  be- 
gan to  get  up  their  steam  at  four  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  and  it  is  a  very  noisy  proc- 
ess, and  it  took  me  some  time  growing 
accustomed  to  the  hissing  noise,  which  was 
very  loud.  There  is  no  real  stillness  and 
silence  in  London  even  in  the  most  select 
districts.  Not,  I  mean,  like  the  country. 
My  aunt  had  one  servant  called  Jane. 
She  had  been  married,  but  her  husband  had 
changed  his  mind  and  run  away  from  her. 
She  was  old  and  grey  and  like  a  fowl,  but 
very  good-tempered.  I  told  her  about  the 
engines  and  she  said: 


OF  SEVENTEEN  13 

"  This  is  London." 

My  aunt  painted  very  beautiful  pictures 
in  oil  colours,  and  also  made  etchings  of  the 
most  exquisite  workmanship.  She  was 
made  R.B.A.  to  reward  her  for  her  great 
genius  in  her  art.  She  hung  her  pictures 
at  exhibitions  and  was  a  well-known 
painter,  though  she  told  me  that  she  did 
not  make  a  great  deal  of  money.  I  hoped 
that  she  would  take  at  least  half  of  my 
fifty  pounds  a  year  for  letting  me  live  with 
her,  and  assured  her  that  I  cared  nothing 
for  money;  then  she  said  we  would  look 
into  that  if  I  passed  my  examination.  She 
was  a  good  deal  interested  in  me,  and  said 
that  I  had  my  dead  mother's  eyes  and  ar- 
tist's hands.  She  was  quite  old  herself, 
and  might  have  been  at  least  forty.  She 
was  not  yet  withered,  like  the  very  old. 
She  wore  double  eyeglasses  when  she 
painted.  Her  expression  was  gloomy,  but 
her  eyes  were  blue  and  still  bright.  I 
found  her  very  much  more  interesting  to 


14  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

talk  to  than  any  other  woman  I  had  met; 
and  I  told  her  my  great  secret  hope  for 
the  future. 

I  said: 

"  Some  day,  if  things  happen  as  I  should 
like,  I  am  going  to  be  an  actor.  It  is  a 
very  difficult  and  uphill  course  of  life,  I 
know;  but  still,  that  is  what  I  want  to  be, 
because  I  have  a  great  feeling  for  the  stage, 
and  I  shall  often  and  often  go  to  a  theatre 
at  night  after  I  have  done  my  day's  work, 
if  you  don't  mind  —  especially  tragedies." 

She  did  n't  laugh  at  the  idea  or  scoff  at  it 
but  she  thought  that  I  must  n't  fill  my  head 
with  anything  but  fire  insurance  for  the 
present.  And  of  course  I  said  that  my 
first  thought  would  be  to  work  in  the  office 
and  thoroughly  earn  my  fifty  pounds,  and 
perhaps  even  earn  more  than  I  was  paid, 
and  so  be  applauded  as  a  clerk  rather  out 
of  the  common. 

She  took  me  to  a  tailor's  shop  and  I  was 
measured  for  a  tail-coat.    I  also  had  to  get 


OF  SEVENTEEN  15 

a  top  hat,  such  as  men  wear.  I  was  tall 
and  thin,  and  when  the  things  came  I  put 
them  on,  and  Aunt  Augusta  said  that  the 
effect  was  good,  and  Jane  said  that  I 
looked  "  quite  the  man."  Aunt  Augusta 
took  me  to  several  picture-galleries,  and  I 
went  about  a  good  deal  by  myself  and 
made  strange  discoveries. 

Many  people  seemed  to  know  that  I  was 
new  in  London  without  my  telling  them. 
Once  I  was  nearly  killed,  showing  how 
easily  accidents  happen.  I  had  dropped  a 
half-penny  in  Oxford  Street,  as  I  crossed 
the  road,  and  was  naturally  stopping  to 
pick  it  up,  when  the  chest  of  a  horse  came 
bang  against  me  and  rolled  me  over.  For- 
tunately, I  was  not  in  my  new  clothes. 
It  was  a  hansom-cab  horse  that  had  run 
into  me,  and  the  driver  pulled  him  up  so 
that  the  horse  simply  skated  along  on  his 
shoes  and  pushed  me  in  front  of  him. 
Neither  of  us  was  hurt.  A  policeman  ap- 
peared, and  the  driver  asked  me  whether  I 


16  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

thought  the  middle  of  Oxford  Street  was 
the  right  place  for  playing  marbles.  He 
meant  it  in  an  insulting  way,  as  if  I  was 
still  a  boy.  And  I  said  that  I  had  dropped 
a  halfpenny  and  couldn't  surely  be  ex- 
pected to  leave  it  in  the  middle  of  London 
for  anybody  to  pick  up. 

The  driver  said  that  no  doubt  I  was  one 
of  God's  chosen  —  meaning  it  rudely  —  and 
the  peojile  laughed,  and  the  policeman  told 
us  all  to  move  on.  I  went  down  a  side 
street  and  cleaned  myself  up  as  well  as  I 
could.  Then  I  found  a  lavatory  and 
washed  myself  and  got  a  shoeblack  to  rub 
the  mud  off  me.  London  mud  is  very 
different  from  all  other  mud,  not  being 
pure,  like  country  mud,  but  adulterated 
with  oil  and  tar  and  many  other  products. 
The  shoeblack  charged  three-pence,  so  it 
was  an  expensive  accident  for  me,  besides 
the  danger. 

I  i^assed  the  examination  though  they 
did  n't  jiraise  me  much,  or  give  any  evi- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  17 

dence  of  pleasure  or  surprise;  and  then  my 
aunt  said  that  she  thought  I  ought  to  call 
on  the  Director  of  the  Apollo  Fire  Office 
and  thank  him  for  his  great  kindness  in 
giving  her  his  nomination  for  me.  The 
Director  was  out,  but  when  he  heard  that 
I  had  called,  he  invited  me  to  dine  with 
him.  I  had  never  been  invited  to  dinner 
before  and  rather  wished  my  aunt  would 
come  too;  but  she  said  that  she  had  not 
been  asked,  though  she  had  often  been 
there  —  to  see  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys  and  his 
original  etchings.  He  followed  art  in  his 
spare  time,  which  was  considerable,  and 
my  aunt  had  given  him  etching  lessons,  at 
which  she  was  a  great  dab.  He  was  also 
a  descendant  of  the  great  Pepys  of  diary 
fame  —  so  my  aunt  told  me.  He  was  a 
bachelor  and  very  fond  of  pictures  and 
very  rich,  as  all  Directors  must  be  be- 
fore they  can  rise  to  that  high  walk  of 
life. 

"  You  ought  to  wear  dress  clothes,"  said 


18  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Aunt  Augusta;  "however,  it  is  not  vital. 
He  will  understand." 

"  You  can  hire  'em  for  a  song,"  de- 
clared Jane;  but  my  aunt  decided  that  I 
should  put  on  my  new  tail-coat  —  with  a 
white  tie. 

When  it  came  to  putting  on  this  tie, 
however,  she  did  n't  care  about  it,  and 
thought  that  I  looked  too  much  like  a 
curate.  She  showed  a  sort  of  objection  to 
curates  that  much  surprised  me;  because 
at  Merivale  there  had  never  been  any  feel- 
ing against  them;  in  fact,  quite  the  con- 
trary. Many  of  the  masters  at  Merivale 
used  to  read  for  the  Church  while  they 
taught  us;  and  when  they  had  read 
enough,  they  went  away  and  gradually  be- 
came curates,  as  the  next  stage  in  their 
careers. 

But  Aunt  Augusta  did  n't  want  me  to 
look  like  one,  and  for  that  matter  I  did  n't 
myself,  having  no  feeling  for  the  Church; 
and  so  I  put  on  a  dark  blue  tie  and  wore 


OF  SEVENTEEN  19 

my  new  silver  watch  and  chain  and  went 
like  that. 

Mr.  Benyon  Pepys  was  a  short,  clean- 
shaved  man  and  lived  in  the  utmost  mag- 
nificence in  a  house  not  far  from  Caven- 
dish Square.  Naturally,  I  had  never  seen 
such  a  house  or  such  magnificence.  It  was 
an  abode  of  the  highest  art.  There  were 
three  footmen  and  a  church  organ  with 
golden  pipes  in  the  hall  alone;  and  every- 
thing was  done  on  the  same  scale  through- 
out. One  footman  asked  me  my  name  and 
another  took  my  overcoat  and  top-hat  and 
hung  them  up  on  a  hat-stand,  of  which 
every  hat-peg  was  the  twisted  horn  of  an 
antelope!  Then  the  man  who  had  asked 
my  name  threw  open  a  door,  on  which 
were  painted  rare  flowers  —  probably  or- 
chids —  and  announced  my  arrival.  "  Mr. 
Corkey!"  he  said  in  a  deep  voice. 

I  walked  in  and  found  Mr.  Benyon 
Pepys  and  Miss  Benyon  Pepys  sitting  one 
on    each    side    of    a    palatial    mantelpiece, 


20  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

which  was  supported  by  the  figures  of 
naked  girls  in  pure  white  marble.  They 
both  rose  from  their  chairs  as  I  walked 
down  the  room  amid  wonderful  creations 
of  art.  They  did  not  seem  to  realise  the 
fact  that  they  were  surrounded  by  such 
amazing  things.  There  were  flowers  and 
pictures  in  huge  gold  frames  and  statues 
on  pedestals;  and,  strange  to  say,  amid  all 
this  i^rofusion  they  allowed  a  mere,  live 
pug-dog  with  a  pink  bow  tied  round  his 
neck!  He  sat  on  a  rug,  which  must  once 
have  been  the  skin  of  a  perfectly  enormous 
tiger.  It  had  glass  eyes  and  its  teeth  were 
left  in  its  jaws,  which  were  red,  as  in  life, 
and  wide  open.  The  pug  lounged  upon  it, 
as  though  to  the  manner  born. 

"  Well,  INIr.  Corker,  so  you  've  passed 
your  examination  and  will  join  us  next 
week,  I  hear,"  said  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys. 
He  spoke  in  a  light,  easy  —  you  might  al- 
most say  a  jaunty  —  tone  of  voice,  though 
he  was  in  full  dress  clothes  and  wore  a  gold 


OF  SEVENTEEN  21 

watch-chain  on  a  spotless  white  waistcoat. 
Miss  Benyon  Pepys  was  just  as  kind  as 
him.  There  was  not  a  spark  of  side  about 
either  of  them.  They  were  both  of  great 
age  and  Mr.  Pepys  was  of  a  shining  and 
complete  baldness,  as  well  as  being  clean- 
shaved.  I  told  him  my  name  was  Corkey, 
not  Corker;  and  he  said,  "  Yes,  yes,  Corker 
—  I  know." 

"  And  how  do  you  like  London? "  asked 
Miss  Benyon  Pepys.  She  was  clad  in  some 
rare  fabric  —  probably  some  fabulous  em- 
broidery from  the  Middle  Ages  —  and 
richly  adorned  with  jewels,  which  flashed 
when  she  moved  her  limbs;  but  she  paid  no 
attention  to  them,  and  was  indeed  far  more 
interested  in  the  pug-dog  than  anything  in 
the  room. 

He  was  called  "  Peter,"  and  made  a 
steady  and  disgusting  noise,  like  a  man 
snoring.  He  came  in  to  dinner  with  us,  and 
had  a  light  meal  off  a  blue  china  plate, 
prepared  by  Miss  Benyon  Pepys. 


22  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

I  was  just  saying  that  I  liked  London, 
and  had  pretty  well  mastered  Oxford 
Street  and  Edgware  Road,  when  a  deep 
and  musical  chime  of  bells  rang  out  and 
the  door  was  thrown  open. 

"  Will  you  take  my  sister  in  to  dinner? " 
said  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys;  but  I  was  pre- 
pared for  this,  because  Aunt  Augusta  had 
warned  me  that  it  might  happen.  So  I 
gave  her  my  right  arm,  and  she  put  the 
tips  of  her  left  hand  fingers  upon  it,  and 
I  remember  feeling  curiously  that,  what 
with  diamonds  and  rubies  and  one  thing 
and  another,  her  hand,  small  though  it 
was,  might  easily  have  been  worth  many 
thousands  of  pounds. 

*'  If  the  mere  sister  of  a  Director  can  do 
this  sort  of  thing,  how  majestic  must  be  the 
wealth  of  the  Director  himself!  "  I  thought. 
In  fact  I  very  nearly  said  it,  because  it 
seemed  to  me  that  the  idea  was  a  great  com- 
pliment and  ought  to  have  pleased  them 
both.     It  would  have  been  well  meant  any- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  23 

way.  But  I  found  it  difficult  to  make 
conversation,  owing  to  the  immense  num- 
ber of  things  all  round  me  that  had  to  be 
noticed. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  couldn't  be  said 
to  take  Miss  Benyon  Pepys  in  to  dinner, 
not  knowing  the  way.  But  she  took  me  in, 
and  it  was  no  mere  dinner,  but  a  dazzling 
banquet  on  a  table  groaning  with  massive 
silver  and  other  forms  of  plate.  There  was 
no  tablecloth  in  the  usual  acceptation  of  the 
word ;  but  a  strip  of  rich  fabric  —  probably 
antique  tapestry  from  France  or  Turkey  — 
spread  on  a  polished  table  which  glittered 
and  reflected  in  its  ebony  depths  the  wax 
candles  and  silver  and  various  pieces  of 
rare  workmanship  arranged  upon  the  hos- 
pitable board. 

One  would  have  thought,  to  see  them, 
that  a  dinner  of  this  kind  —  seven  courses 
not  counting  dessert  —  was  an  everyday 
thing  with  the  Benyon  Pepys!  It  may 
have  been,  for  all  I  know.     Wine  flowed 


24  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

like  water  —  at  least,  it  would  have  done 
so  if  there  had  been  anybody  there  to  drink 
it ;  but,  of  course,  I  did  n't,  knowing  well 
that  wine  goes  to  the  head  if  you  're  not 
used  to  it  —  and  Miss  Benyon  Pepys 
merely  drank  hot  water  with  a  little  tablet 
of  some  chemical  that  fizzed  away  in  it  — 
medicine,  I  suppose.  It  was  sad  in  a  way 
to  see  her  pass  the  luxurious  dishes  without 
touching  them.  She  little  knew  what  she 
was  missing.  Even  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys 
himself  only  sipped  each  wine  in  turn,  with 
birdlike  sips,  but  he  never  drank  his  glass 
quite  empty.  I  expect  the  footmen  dashed 
off  what  he  left,  doubtless  tossing  up 
among  themselves  which  should  have  it. 

I  tried  to  talk  at  dinner,  though  there 
was  little  time,  and  once  a  good  thing,  full 
of  rich  and  rare  flavours,  was  swept  away 
before  I  had  finished  it,  because  I  stopped 
to  speak. 

I  asked  after  the  Pepys  diaries  and 
hoped  they  were  successful.     I  said: 


OF  SEVENTEEN  25 

"  I  shall,  of  course,  keep  a  diary  in  Lon- 
don, and  I  was  going  to  get  a  Raphael 
Tuck  diary;  but  I  shall  buy  a  Pepys  now." 

Looking  back,  I  don't  think  either  of 
them  heard  this.  At  any  rate,  that  night 
when  my  Aunt  Augusta  explained  about  it, 
I  prayed  to  God  in  my  prayers  that  they 
might  not  have  heard.  The  footmen,  how- 
ever, must  have. 

But  I  made  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys  laugh 
with  a  remark  which,  curiously  enough,  was 
not  in  the  least  amusing  nor  intended  to 
be.    I  said: 

"  Of  course,  the  business  of  a  Director  is 
to  direct?" 

Because  I  thought  it  would  show  a 
proper  spirit  to  be  interested  in  his  great 
work.    But  he  laughed,  and  said: 

"  Not  always,  Mr.  Corker,  not  always ! 
I  am  not  myself  a  man  of  business;  but  a 
connoisseur  and  creator.  Art  is  my  occu- 
pation. Do  not,  however,  think  that  I  am 
not  exceedingly  interested  in  the  Apollo. 


26  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

You  will  find  upon  the  face  of  each  policy 
an  allegorical  representation  of  the  sun- 
god  in  a  chariot  drawn  by  four  horses.  I 
cannot  claim  that  the  actual  design  is 
mine,  but  the  conception  sprang  from  my 
brain  twenty-five  years  ago.  The  creation, 
though  severely  Greek,  is  my  own." 

He  explained  that  he  had  found  the 
greatest  difficulty  to  get  anybody  to  accept 
his  nomination  to  the  Apollo  Fire  Office. 

"  But  fortunately,"  he  said,  "  your  aunt, 
the  accomplished  artist,  was  able  to  help 
me,  and  I  feel  under  no  little  obligation  to 
her  —  and  you." 

In  this  graceful  and  gentlemanly  way 
he  spoke  to  me.  He  told  me  that  the  staff 
was  very  large  and  included  men  of  all 
ages  —  many  brilliant  and  some  ordinary. 

"  You  will  begin  work  in  the  Country 
Department,"  he  said ;  "  they  are  a  bit 
rough-and-ready  up  there,  I  fancy,  but  I 
speak  only  from  hearsay.  Certain  adven- 
turous members  of  the  Board  have  pene- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  27 

trated  to  those  savage  regions,  though  T 
cannot  honestly  say  that  I  have  ever  ven- 
tured. After  signing  a  hundred  or  two 
policies,  my  intellect  reels  and  I  have  to 
totter  over  to  Murch's  for  turtle-soup.  It 
is  a  curious  fact  that  turtle  restores  brain- 
fag quicker  than  any  other  form  of  food." 

"  I  am  glad  it  has  such  a  good  effect  on 
you,  sir,"  I  said. 

Miss  Pepys  left  when  the  magnificent 
dessert  was  served.  She  never  touched  so 
much  as  a  grape,  though  they  were  the 
largest  I  had  ever  seen;  and  after  she  had 
gone,  Mr.  Pepys  asked  me  to  smoke. 
Knowing,  of  course,  that  a  cigarette  is 
nothing  on  a  full  stomach,  and  also  know- 
ing that  my  own  stomach  was  now  per- 
fectly adapted  for  it,  I  consented,  and  had 
a  priceless  box  of  chased  silver  containing 
rare  Egyptian  cigarettes  handed  to  me  by 
one  of  the  footmen.  With  it  he  brought 
a  lamp,  which  appeared  to  be  —  and  very 
likely  was  —  of  solid  gold.     We  then  had 


28  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

coffee;  and  when  all  was  over,  Mr.  Benyon 
Pepys  proposed  that  we  should  again  join 
JNIiss  Benyon  Pepj^s;  so  we  returned  to  the 
drawing-room  and  he  showed  me  a  port- 
folio of  his  etchings.  They  were  black  and 
grubby  and  mysterious  and  no  doubt  great 
masterpieces,  if  I  had  only  understood 
them.  Even  as  it  was,  I  rather  came  off 
over  the  etchings  and  recognised  many 
things  about  them  in  a  way  that  everybody 
did  n't.  At  least,  I  gathered  so  from  the 
fact  that  INIr.  Benyon  Pepys  was  surprised 
and  pleased.  He  said  that  "  chiaro- 
oscuro  "  was  the  secret  of  his  success,  and 
no  doubt  it  may  have  been.  He  praised 
my  Aunt  Augusta  very  highly;  and  I  was 
exceedingly  glad  to  hear  him  speak  so  well 
of  her  great  genius  in  her  art. 

At  ten  o'clock  I  got  up  to  go,  and  a 
footman  whistled  at  the  door  for  a  cab,  and 
I  luckily  had  a  sixpence  which  I  pressed 
into  his  hand  as  I  leapt  into  the  cab.  But 
the  effect  was  spoiled,  because  I  forgot  my 


OF  SEVENTEEN  29 

overcoat  and  had  to  leap  out  again.  The 
footman  helped  me  into  it,  but  did  n't  men- 
tion the  sixpence.  I  dare  say  to  him  it  was 
a  thing  of  nought. 

So  I  returned  to  Aunt  Augusta's  flat, 
and  told  her  all  about  the  wonders  of  the 
evening;  and  she  was  pleased  and  said  that 
she  hoped  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys  would  some 
day  ask  me  again.  But  no  such  thing  hap- 
pened. And,  of  course,  there  was  no  rea- 
son why  it  should.  Probably  they  did  hear 
what  I  said  about  the  diary,  but  were  too 
highly  born  and  refined  to  take  any  notice. 


Ill 


THE  great  first  day  at  the  Apollo 
Fire  Office  soon  came,  and  my 
Aunt  Augusta  seemed  to  be  quite 
moved  as,  having  discussed  two  poached 
eggs,  a  roll,  butter,  toast,  and  marmalade, 
and  two  cups  of  coffee,  I  went  forth  in 
my  top-hat  and  tail-coat  to  earn  my  living. 
Women  are  rum.  She  'd  worked  like  any- 
thing to  get  me  this  great  appointment, 
and  yet,  when  I  started  off  in  the  best 
possible  stjde  to  begin.  Aunt  Augusta 
seemed  distinctly  sniffy!  I  took  an  omni- 
bus from  Oxford  Street,  having  previously 
walked  down  Harley  Street,  wliich  is  a 
great  haunt  of  the  medical  profession. 
Merely  to  walk  down  it  and  read  the  names 
is  a  solemn  thing  to  do,  and  makes  you 
thank  God  for  being  pretty  well. 


THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN    31 

In  due  course  I  arrived  at  my  destina- 
tion, in  Threadneedle  Street  in  the  very 
heart  of  the  City  of  London.  First  you 
come  to  the  Bank  of  England  —  an  impos- 
ing edifice  quite  black  with  centuries  of 
London  fog  —  and  opposite  this  is  the 
Royal  Exchange,  whose  weather-vane  is  a 
grasshopper  covered  with  gold  and  of  enor- 
mous size.  Often  and  often,  from  the 
Country  Department  of  the  Apollo  I  used 
to  look  up  at  it  and  long  to  be  in  the  green 
places  where  real  grasshoppers  occur  so 
freely. 

But,  to  return,  I  walked  into  the  Apollo, 
which  comes  next  to  the  Bank  of  England, 
and  found  there  was  a  book  on  the  first 
floor  of  the  office,  in  which  every  member 
of  the  staff  had  to  sign  his  name  on  arriv- 
ing. When  the  hour  of  ten  struck,  a  clerk 
came  forward,  dipped  his  pen  into  the  red 
ink,  picked  up  a  ruler  and  drew  a  line 
across  the  page.  This  was  to  separate  the 
clerks  who  were  in  time   from  those  who 


32  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

were  late.  If  you  were  under  the  red  line 
more  than  once  or  twice  in  a  month,  you 
heard  about  it  unfavourably. 

There  was  an  amazing  record  of  a  won- 
derful old  clerk  who  had  worked  in  the 
office  for  forty-five  years  and  never  once 
been  under  the  line!  But  at  last  there 
came  a  day  when  the  hour  of  ten  rang  out 
and  the  old  clerk  had  not  come.  Every- 
body was  very  excited  over  it,  and  they 
actually  gave  him  ten  minutes'  grace,  which 
was  not  lawful,  but  a  sporting  and  a  proper 
thing  to  do  in  my  opinion.  However,  all 
was  without  avail;  for  he  did  not  come, 
and  the  red  line  had  to  be  reluctantly 
drawn.  Everybody  almost  trembled  to 
know  what  the  old  clerk  would  do  when  he 
arrived  to  find  the  record  of  forty-five 
years  was  ended;  but  the  old  clerk  never 
did  arrive,  because  a  telegram  came,  a  few 
minutes  after  the  drawing  of  the  line,  to 
say  that  he  had  died  in  his  sleep  at  his 
wife's  side,  and  therefore  could  not  get  up 


OF  SEVENTEEN  33 

at  six  o'clock,  which  was  his  rule.  It  was 
rather  sad  in  a  way. 

To  show,  however,  that  everybody  did  n't 
feel  the  same  rare  spirit  of  punctuality  as 
the  old  clerk,  there  was  another  interesting 
story  of  the  red  line  and  a  chap  who  ar- 
rived late  on  his  very  first  day.  He  ac- 
tually began  his  official  career  under  the 
red  line.  He  must  have  been  a  man  like 
the  great  Napoleon  in  some  ways.  A  very 
self-willed  sort  of  man,  in  fact.  He  only 
stopped  in  the  Apollo  a  fortnight,  and  then 
was  invited  to  seek  another  sphere  of  ac- 
tivity. He  was  a  nephew  of  one  of  the 
Directors  and  died  in  the  Zulu  War.  A 
pity  for  him  he  had  not  been  of  a  clerk-like 
turn  of  mind. 

I  signed  the  book  in  full: 

"  Norman  Bryan  Corkey." 

and  then  a  messenger,  who  wore  a  blue 
tail-coat  with  a  glittering  disc  of  silver  on 
his  breast,  showed  me  up  to  the  Country 


34  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Department.  It  was  at  the  very  top  of 
the  edifice  —  a  long  room  with  desks  ar- 
ranged in  such  a  way  that  the  hght  from 
the  stately  windows  should  fall  upon  them. 
About  thirty-five  men  of  all  ages  pursued 
their  avocation  of  making  policies  in  this 
great  room.  The  Chief  had  an  apartment 
leading  out  of  this,  and  usually  he  sat  in 
great  seclusion,  pondering  over  the  affairs 
of  the  Department.  He  was  a  big  and  a 
stout  man,  with  a  florid  face  and  a  beard 
and  mustache  of  brown  hair.  His  eyes 
were  grey  and  penetrating.  They  roamed 
over  the  Department  sometimes,  when  he 
came  to  the  door  of  his  own  room;  and  he 
saw  instantly  everything  that  was  going  on 
and  noted  it  down,  in  a  capacious  memory, 
for  future  use.  Everybody  liked  him,  for 
he  was  a  kind  and  a  good  and  a  patient 
man,  and  his  ability  must  have  been  very 
great  to  have  reached  such  a  high  position; 
for  he  was  much  younger  than  many  other 
men  who  were  under  him.     He  welcomed 


OF  SEVENTEEN  35 

me  with  friendliness  and  hoped  I  should 
settle  down  and  soon  take  to  the  work. 

He  said: 

"  Be  industrious,  Mr.  Corkey,  and  let  me 
have  the  pleasure  of  reporting  favourably 
when  the  time  comes  to  give  an  account  of 
your  labours  to  the  Secretary." 

I  said: 

"  Yes,  sir,  I  will  do  my  best." 

He  looked  at  me  and  smiled. 

"  A  great  promise,"  he  said.  "  To  do 
your  best,  Mr.  Corkey,  is  to  be  one  man 
picked  out  of  a  thousand." 

I  had  no  idea,  then,  that  it  was  such  a 
rare  thing  to  do  your  best;  but  he  knew. 
And  I  found  afterwards  that  it  is  not  only 
rare  but  frightfully  difficult,  and  no  doubt 
that  is  why  so  few  people  do  it. 

Mr.  Westonshaugh,  for  that  was  the 
name  of  this  good  man,  called  a  subordi- 
nate, and  a  fair,  pale  clerk  in  the  prime  of 
life,  with  a  large  amber  mustache  and  a 
high  forehead,  responded  to  the  summons. 


36  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"This  is  Mr.  Corkey,"  said  the  Chief. 
"  He  goes  into  your  division,  Mr.  Blades. 
I  need  not  ask  you  to  look  after  him  and 
indicate  the  duties.  He  passed  a  good 
examination  and  is  quite  ready  to  set  to 
work." 

I  followed  Mr.  Blades  and  walked  down 
the  great  room.  There  were  two  desks 
apart  in  one  corner  at  which  old,  bald, 
spectacled  men  sat,  and  at  the  other  desks, 
already  mentioned,  the  full  strength  of  the 
Department  was  already  busily  occupied. 

I  found  an  empty  desk  waiting  for  me 
beside  Mr.  Blades,  and  I  could  see  by  his 
manner,  which  was  kindly  but  penetrating, 
that  he  was  considering  what  sort  of  clerk 
I  should  make.  Others  also  looked  at  me. 
One  man  said  "  Legs!  "  referring  to  mine, 
which  were  very  long.  There  was  a  strange 
and  helpless  feeling  about  it  all.  I  dimly 
remembered  feeling  just  the  same  when  I 
first  went  to  JNIerivalc.  Mr.  Blades  called 
a  messenger  and  bade  him  bring  pens,  fill 


OF  SEVENTEEN  37 

the  ink-bottles  and  fetch  blotting-paper 
and  paper-cutter,  a  ruler,  an  ink  eraser, 
and  other  clerkly  instruments. 

"  Your  first  duty,"  he  said,  "  is  to  copy 
policies  into  the  books.  Here  is  a  pile  of 
policies  and  they  are  numbered  in  order. 
There  are  no  abbreviations  on  the  actual 
policy;  but  abbreviations  are  allowed  in 
copying  them  into  the  books.  This  saves 
many  hours  of  time.  For  instance,  the 
word  '  communicating '  occurs  over  and 
over  again.  So,  in  copying  it,  we  reduce 
it  to  three  letters,  namely  '  com.'  I  will 
now  copy  a  policy  and  you  can  see  how  I 
do  it." 

Mr.  Blades  was  kindness  itself  and,  in- 
deed, from  that  day  forward  I  blessed  his 
name.  He  was  a  brick.  He  was  fierce 
certainly,  and  if  angered,  as  sometimes  hap- 
pened, would  utter  dreadful  imprecations, 
such  as  I  thought  were  only  to  be  heard 
among  pirates  and  other  story-book  people ; 
but  he  had  a  big  heart  and  a  very  heroic 


38  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

mind.  He  feared  nothing  and,  though  a 
small  man,  exliibited  great  courage  on 
many  occasions  in  his  private  life,  of  which 
he  told  me  when  I  knew  him  better.  He 
was  married  and  lived  at  Bickleigh  and  had 
offsi^ring. 

I  settled  to  the  work  and  nothing  much 
happened,  though  I  had  very  often  to  refer 
to  Mr.  Blades.  He  never  minded  and  was 
always  ready  with  his  wide  knowledge, 
which,  of  course,  extended  far  beyond  the 
copying  that  I  had  to  do.  In  fact,  the 
Department  teemed  with  men  of  the  great- 
est ability,  and  not  only  did  every  one  of 
them  exhibit  perfect  mastery  of  the  com- 
plicated art  of  drawing-out  of  insurance 
policies  against  fire,  but  many  of  them, 
as  I  found  gradually  —  in  fact,  almost 
every  one  —  had  some  remarkable  talent 
which  was  not  wanted  in  their  official  tasks. 
Some  could  draw  and  some  could  play 
various  musical  instruments; some  were  very 
keen  sportsmen  and  understood  cricket  and 


OF  SEVENTEEN  39 

football  and  other  branches;  and  some  were 
great  readers  and  knew  all  about  literature. 
Some,  again,  were  gardeners  and  cultivated 
most  beautiful  exotics,  which  they  brought 
to  the  office  to  raffle  from  time  to  time. 
Others,  again,  arranged  sweepstakes  on 
horse-races  and  brightened  up  the  dull 
routine  of  official  life  in  this  way.  Others 
were  volunteers  and  very  keen  about  sol- 
diering. I  hoped  that  I  might  find  some- 
body interested  in  the  stage,  but  curiously 
enough,  though  many  went  to  the  theatre, 
none  ever  wanted  to  become  professional 
actors. 

When  the  luncheon  interval  arrived  I 
was  allowed  to  go  out  for  refreshments, 
and  I  went  and  walked  about  in  the  City 
of  London.  But  I  did  not  go  farther  than 
the  huge  figures  that  beat  time  over  a 
watchmaker's  shop  in  Cheapside.  It  must 
have  been  wonderful  mechanism,  and  I 
should  like  to  have  had  it  explained,  but 
there  was  no  time  to  go  into  the  shop.     And, 


40  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

in  any  case,  I  should  n't  have  had  the  cheek 
to  ask.  By  a  funny  chance,  near  the  Royal 
Exchange  I  found  the  identical  JNIurch's 
shop,  where  Mr.  Benyon  Pepys  used  to  go 
and  have  turtle-soup  after  the  labours  of 
signing  policies;  so  I  thought  that  if  it 
suited  him  so  well,  it  might  suit  me  also. 
With  great  presence  of  mind,  however,  I 
first  asked  the  price  of  a  plate,  and  on 
hearing  it,  made  some  hurried  excuse  and 
went  back  into  the  street.  Turtle-soup  is 
out  of  the  question  for  beginners  in  the 
City  of  London.  I  had  a  Bath  bun  and  a 
glass  of  milk  instead  and  then  went  back 
to  work. 

It  was  after  returning  that  the  first  thing 
that  I  really  imderstood  and  enjoyed  hap- 
pened at  the  Apollo.  Up  till  then  I  felt 
rather  small  and  helpless  and  strange. 
Here  was  I,  like  an  ant  in  a  nest,  but  I 
felt  a  fool  of  an  ant  —  good  for  nothing 
but  to  make  mistakes  and  worry  Mr. 
Blades.     The  huge  whirl  and  rush  of  busi- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  41 

ness  dazed  me.  I  almost  heard  the  thunder 
of  machinery;  but  I  knew  really  that  all 
the  machinery  was  going  on  inside  the 
heads  of  those  thirty-five  able  and  indus- 
trious men.  I  expected  that  they  were 
working  for  their  wives  and  children  and 
their  old,  infirm  mothers  and  so  on.  It 
was  real  grim  life.  It  is  true  there  were  a 
few  boys  there  besides  me;  but  they  also 
were  able  and  industrious,  if  not  brilliant, 
and  they  were  all  doing  their  part  in  the 
great  machine.  Even  the  messengers  were. 
They  were  nearly  all  old,  brave,  wounded 
soldiers.  I  felt  the  solemnity.  I  seemed 
like  a  mere  insect  in  a  solemn  cathedral 
where  a  mighty  service  was  going  on  and 
everybody  was  doing  their  appointed  part 
but  me.  I  had  spoiled  several  large  sheets 
of  paper  and  felt  a  sort  of  sick  feeling  that 
I  was  not  earning  my  fifty  pounds  a  year, 
and  should  soon  be  told  so.  I  made  a  cal- 
culation on  my  blotting-paper  to  see  how 
much  money   I   ought   to   earn   each   day. 


42  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

The  amount  discouraged  me  and,  besides 
that,  I  had  another  sort  of  animal  feeHng 
that  I  was  n't  getting  enough  air  to  breathe. 
Then,  in  this  dark  and  despairing  moment, 
there  happened  a  thing  that  bucked  me  up 
and  put  new  life  into  me.  Suddenly  I  got 
a  terrific  smack  on  the  side  of  the  face, 
and  an  orange,  about  half  sucked,  fell  from 
my  cheek  upon  the  page  spread  before  me. 
It  was  like  a  pleasant  breath  of  Merivale. 
I  understood  it;  I  knew  how  to  handle  it. 
For  a  moment  I  no  longer  felt  like  an 
insect  in  some  vast  cathedral.  I  was  deeply 
interested  and  hoped  that  the  man  who 
could  do  a  thing  of  this  sort  in  a  solemn 
scene  like  the  Country  Department  of  the 
Apollo  Fire  Office,  might  be  a  real  friend 
to  me.  It  happened  that,  as  I  came  back 
from  lunching,  I  had  seen  a  j^oung  man 
with  the  lid  of  his  desk  raised.  His  head 
was  inside  and  he  was  sucking  this  identical 
orange  that  had  now  hit  me  in  the  face. 
I  felt  at  the  time  that  the  man  who  could 


OF  SEVENTEEN  43 

suck  an  orange  in  the  midst  of  this  boom- 
ing hive  of  industry  must  be  out  of  the 
common.  And  so  he  proved  to  be.  He 
was  dark  and  clean-shaved,  with  broad 
shoulders  and  a  purple  chin.  I  knew, 
therefore,  when  the  orange  arrived,  who 
had  chucked  it,  and  could  not  help  feeling 
the  purple-chinned  young  man  was  a  jolly 
good  shot,  whatever  else  he  might  be.  I 
laughed  when  the  orange  hit  me,  and 
looked  over  to  him;  but  he  was  writing 
very  busily  and  not  a  muscle  moved.  I 
didn't  dare  chuck  the  half-sucked  orange 
back,  for  fear  of  making  a  boss  shot,  the 
consequences  of  which  might  have  been 
very  serious,  because  at  least  three  men  of 
considerable  age,  and  one  grey,  sat  between 
us.  So  I  picked  up  the  orange  and  got  off 
my  stool. 

"  Sit  down!  don't  take  any  notice,"  said 
Mr.  Blades,  who  was  trying  not  to  laugh 
and  failing;  but  I  felt  that  perhaps  he 
did  n't  quite  understand  a  thing  like  this, 


44  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

having  passed  the  stage  for  it  and  being 
married  and  so  on;  whereas  no  doubt  the 
piiri3le-chinned  young  man,  if  he  could 
chuck  an  orange,  could  also  get  it  back 
without  taking  it  in  the  wrong  spirit. 

A  good  many  chaps  watched  me  and 
some  thought  I  was  going  to  take  the 
orange  into  Mr.  Westonshaugh ;  but  I  just 
went  casually  up  the  room,  and  when  I 
got  to  the  purple-chinned  young  man,  who 
was  writing  away  like  mad,  I  stopped  and 
turned  suddenly. 

"  A  ripping  shot,"  I  said.  "  I  funked 
flinging  it  back  for  fear  of  hitting  the 
wrong  man." 

Then  I  squashed  down  the  orange  hard 
on  the  purple-chinned  young  man's  head 
and  hooked  back  to  my  desk. 

"You  long-legged  young  devil!"  he 
shouted,  but  he  was  n't  angry,  only  sur- 
prised. There  was  rather  a  row  then,  be- 
cause a  good  many  chaps  laughed  out  loud 
and  Mr.  Westonshaugh  came  to  his  door. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  45 

"  Not  so  much  noise,  gentlemen,  please," 
he  said,  and  then  went  in  again. 

Half  an  hour  afterwards  the  purple- 
chinned  young  man,  whose  name  was  Dicky 
Travers,  came  up  to  my  desk. 

"  It 's  all  right,"  he  began.  "  It  was  a 
fair  score;  but  how  the  devil  did  you  know 
that  I  threw  it?  I  '11  swear  you  didn't  see 
me." 

"  I  did  n't,"  I  admitted ;  "  but  when  I 
came  in  from  lunch  you  were  sucking 
it  with  your  head  in  your  desk,  so  I 
guessed." 

That  man  turned  out  one  of  my  very 
best  and  dearest  friends  in  the  Apollo  Fire 
Office!  He  proved  to  be  an  athlete  of 
world-wide  fame  and  a  member  of  the 
London  Athletic  Club.  He  had  won  count- 
less trophies  and  cups  and  clocks  and  cel- 
larettes  and  salad  bowls,  and  was  simply 
tired  of  seeing  his  name  in  print.  He 
was  a  champion  walker  and  had  on  several 
occasions    walked    seven    miles    inside    an 


46  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

hour;  and  two  miles  in  fifteen  minutes  was 
mere  fun  to  him! 

So  ended  my  first  day  of  work.  At  four 
o'clock  a  good  number  of  the  clerks  pre- 
pared to  leave  and  Mr.  Blades  told  me 
that  I  could  go.  Of  course  I  thanked  him 
very  much  for  all  his  kindness  during  the 
day. 

"  That 's  all  right,"  he  said;  "  and  to-mor- 
row bring  an  office  coat  with  you  and  keep 
that  swagger  one  for  out  of  doors.  Let  it 
be  a  dark  colour  —  in  fact,  black  for  choice. 
It's  better  form.  And  to-morrow  I  will 
show  you  how  you  can  keep  your  cuffs 
clean  by  putting  paper  over  them.  Now 
you  put  your  work  into  your  desk  and 
lock  it  up  and  go  home.  You  have  made 
a  very  decent  start." 

I  thanked  him  again  and  cleared  out. 

I  walked  back  and  spent  a  very  interest- 
ing hour  looking  into  the  shops  and  so  on. 
There  was  a  place  in  High  Holborn  full  of 
models    of    steam    engines,    and    I    rather 


OF  SEVENTEEN  47 

longed  for  one.  But  it  cost  three  pounds. 
Besides,  I  was  now,  of  course,  past  child- 
ish things  and  thought  no  more  of  it.  I 
stopped,  too,  to  see  some  Blue  Coat  boys 
playing  "  footer  "  in  a  playground  that  was 
railed  off  from  the  street  by  lofty  railings. 
It  was  somewhere  near  the  General  Post 
Office,  I  believe.  Some  of  the  chaps,  de- 
spite their  long  coats,  which  they  strapped 
round  their  waists,  played  jolly  well.  I 
felt  it  would  have  been  fine  to  have  gone 
in  and  had  a  kick  about.  But,  of  course, 
the  days  for  that  were  past.  It  was  rather 
sad  in  a  way.  But,  there  it  was  —  I  'd 
grown  up.  I  had  to  keep  reminding  my- 
self of  this,  and  now  and  then  my  beastly 
top-hat  fell  off  and  reminded  me  again. 
Only  it  takes  a  bit  of  time  to  realise  such 
a  thing.  In  fact,  I  've  heard  grey-haired 
men  say  that  they  don't  feel  a  bit  old, 
though  they  may  be  simply  fossils  really, 
to  the  critical  eye;  so,  no  doubt,  it  was 
natural  even  for  me  not  to  feel  that  I  had 


48     THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

grown  lip,  and  had  now  got  to  face  things 
and  run  my  own  show,  as  well  as  I  could, 
for  evermore.  To  rub  it  in,  as  it  were,  I 
had  my  first  shave  on  the  way  home.  Mr. 
Blades  had  advised  this  course. 

Aunt  Augusta  showed  a  great  deal  of 
interest  in  the  day's  adventures,  and  next 
morning  I  took  a  dark  blue  "  blazer  "  to 
the  office.  It  had  the  badge  of  Merivale 
first  footer  team  on  it;  but,  of  course,  I 
made  my  aunt  cut  that  off.  Because, 
though  it  meant  a  good  deal  at  Merivale, 
to  a  man  earning  his  own  living  in  a  hive 
of  industry,  it  simply  counted  for  nothing 
at  all. 


IV 


WHEN  I  heard  that  there  was  a 
cricket  ckib  in  connection  with 
the  Apollo  Fire  Office  I  was 
glad,  and  still  more  so  when  I  found  that 
the  team  played  other  Fire  Offices;  for  the 
Apollo  is  by  no  means  the  only  one  in  Lon- 
don, though  easily  the  best.  Of  course  I 
never  thought  that  in  an  office  full  of 
grown  men  I  should  be  able  to  play  in 
matches;  but  Dicky  Tr avers  explained  to 
me  that  I  might  hope,  if  I  was  any  good, 
as  only  a  comparatively  small  number  of 
the  clerks  actually  played,  though  a  large 
number  patronised  the  games  with  their 
presence  and  came  to  the  Annual  Dinner 
at  the  far-famed  Holborn  Restaurant. 
This  restaurant,  I  may  say,  is  almost  a 
palace  in  itself,  and  the  walls  are  decorated 
with  sumptuous  marbles  and  works  of  for- 


50  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

eign  art.  The  waiters  are  also  foreign. 
There  are  fountains  and  a  hand  to  play 
while  you  eat;  and  it  shows  how  accus- 
tomed the  London  mind  can  get  to  almost 
anything  in  the  way  of  luxury,  for  I  have 
seen  people  eating  through  brilliant  master- 
pieces of  music  and  not  in  the  least  put  off 
their  food  by  them,  though  every  instru- 
ment in  the  band  was  playing  simulta- 
neously. But,  of  course,  there  were  no 
bands  or  fountains  where  I  went  for  my 
Bath  bun  and  glass  of  milk.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  this  was  rather  a  light  meal 
for  me,  but  I  hoped  to  get  accustomed  to 
it.  Anyway  the  result,  when  dinner-time 
came  at  the  flat  of  my  Aunt  Augusta,  was 
remarkably  good,  and  I  used  to  eat  in  a 
way  that  filled  her  with  fear.  And,  after 
eating,  I  felt  that  I  simply  must  have  ex- 
ercise of  some  sort,  and  I  used  to  go  out 
in  the  dark  to  the  Regent's  Park  and  run 
for  miles  at  my  best  pace.  It  worried 
policemen  when  I  flew  past  them,  because 


OF  SEVENTEEN  51 

it  is  very  unusual  to  race  about  after  dark 
in  London  if  you  are  honest,  and  police- 
men are,  unfortunately,  a  suspicious  race 
and,  owing  to  their  work,  get  into  the  way 
of  thinking  that  anything  out  of  the  com- 
mon may  be  a  clew.  Once  having  flown 
past  a  policeman  and  run  without  stopping 
to  a  certain  lamp-post,  I  went  back  to  the 
man  and  explained  to  him  that  I  had  to 
sit  on  an  office  stool  most  of  the  day,  and 
that  at  night,  after  dinner,  I  felt  a  fright- 
ful need  for  active  exercise,  and  so  took  it 
in  this  way.  I  thought  he  would  rather 
applaud  the  idea,  but  he  said  it  was  a  fool's 
game  and  might  lead  to  trouble  if  I  per- 
sisted in  it.  He  advised  me  to  join  an 
athletic  club  and  a  gymnasium,  and  I  told 
him  that  the  advice  was  good  and  thanked 
him.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  was  able  to 
tell  the  policeman  also  that  a  great  friend 
of  mine  had  put  me  up  for  the  London 
Athletic  Club,  and  that  I  hoped  soon  to 
hear  that  I  had  been  elected  as  a  member. 


52  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

I  mentioned  Dicky  Travers  and  thought 
the  poHceman  would  be  a  good  deal  sur- 
prised that  I  actually  knew  this  famous 
man.  However,  the  surprise  was  mine, 
because  the  policeman  had  never  heard  of 
him.  But  sport  was  a  sealed  book  to  him, 
as  the  saying  is. 

I  only  remember  one  other  thing  about 
those  runs.  I  used  to  put  on  very  little 
clothes,  of  course,  but  even  so,  naturally 
worked  myself  up  into  a  terrific  perspira- 
tion, which  was  what  I  meant  to  do,  it 
being  a  most  healthful  thing  for  people 
who  have  to  sit  still  all  day.  But  my  aunt 
was  quite  alarmed  when  I  returned  to  have 
a  bath  and  a  rub  down;  and  then  it  came 
out  that  she  had  never  seen  anybody  in  a 
real  perspiration  before!  I  roared  with 
laughter  and  explained,  and  she  said  that 
she  thought  people  only  had  perspirations 
when  they  were  ill.  She  had  never  been  in 
one  in  her  whole  life  apparently.  She  was 
a  very  nice  and  kind  woman,  but  I  puzzled 


OF  SEVENTEEN  53 

her  fearfully,  because  she  had  never  known 
many  boys  of  my  age,  and  though  she 
smoked  cigarettes  herself,  she  thought  they 
were  bad  for  me  and  begged  me  to  be  very 
temperate  in  the  use  of  them.  To  be  tem- 
perate in  everything  was  a  mania  with  her. 
I  must  have  upset  her  flat  a  lot  one  way 
and  another;  but  she  was  very  patient  and 
wouldn't  hear  of  my  going  into  lodgings 
alone. 

"  You  are  much  too  young,"  she  said. 
"  You  must  look  upon  me  as  your  mother 
till  5^ou  are  eighteen,  at  any  rate." 

Then  it  was  —  after  I  had  been  in  the 
City  of  London  six  weeks  —  that  I  met 
with  my  first  great  misfortune,  though  it 
began  as  a  most  hopeful  and  promising 
affair. 

I  had  heard,  of  course,  from  Dicky 
Travers  and  Mr.  Blades  and  others,  that 
there  were  plenty  of  shady  characters  in 
London,  and  that  their  shadiness  took  all 
sorts  of  forms;  but  this  did  not  bother  me 


54  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

much,  because  a  clerk  such  as  I  was  would 
not,  I  thought,  provoke  a  shady  character, 
owing  to  my  youth.  But  a  good  many  of 
these  shady  characters  mark  down  young 
men  as  their  regular  and  lawful  prey,  like 
the  tiger  marks  down  the  bison  in  the  jun- 
gle. And  a  great  feature  of  the  cunning 
of  these  people  is  that  they  get  themselves 
up  in  a  way  to  hide  their  real  natures  —  in 
fact,  such  is  their  ingenuity,  that  they  pre- 
tend to  go  to  the  other  extreme,  and  ap- 
pear before  their  victims  dressed  just  the 
very  opposite  of  what  one  would  expect 
in  a  shady  character.  They  are,  in  fact, 
full  of  deceit. 

One  day  I  had  eaten  my  bun  and  drunk 
my  glass  of  milk  in  about  a  second  and 
a  half,  and  was  looking  at  books  in  a  very 
interesting  bookseller's  window  that  spread 
out  into  the  street  near  that  historic  build- 
ing known  as  the  Mansion  House,  where 
the  Lord  JNIayor  lives.  I  had  found  a  six- 
penny book  about  Mr.  Henry  Irving's  art 


OF  SEVENTEEN  55 

and  was  just  going  to  purchase  it,  bringing 
from  my  pocket  a  five-pound  note  to  do  so, 
when  an  old  man  of  a  rehgious  and  gen- 
tlemanly appearance  spoke  to  me. 

But  first,  to  calm  the  natural  excitement 
of  the  reader  at  hearing  me  mention  a  five- 
pound  note,  I  ought  to  explain  that  that 
morning  was  pay-day  at  the  office  —  the 
first  in  which  I  had  actively  participated. 
The  five-pound  note  was  the  first  that  I  had 
ever  earned,  and  it  gave  me  a  great  deal 
of  satisfaction  to  feel  it  in  my  pocket.  This 
was  natural. 

"  Good  literature  here,  sir,"  said  the 
stranger.    "  I  hope  you  love  books?  " 

"  Yes,  I  do,"  I  answered,  concealing  my 
five  pounds  instantly. 

"  I  write  books,"  he  told  me.  "  I  dare 
say  my  name  is  familiar  enough  to  you,  if 
you  are  a  reader  of  poetry." 

I  looked  at  him  and  saw  that  he  had  a 
long  grey  beard  and  red  rims  to  his  eyes. 
His  clothes  were  black  and  had  seen  better 


5G  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

days.  He  wore  rather  a  low  waistcoat 
which  was  touched  here  and  there  with 
grease;  but  his  shirt  was  fairly  white,  and 
through  his  beard  I  saw  a  black  tie  under 
his  chin.  He  was  tall,  and  carried  an  um- 
brella and  a  black  and  rather  tattered  bag 
of  leather.  I  seemed  to  feel  that  his  black 
bag  was  heavy  with  great  poetry.  It  was  a 
solemn  moment  for  me. 

"  I  'm  afraid  I  'm  not  much  of  a  hand 
at  poetry,  sir,"  I  said.  "  At  school  one 
had  a  lot  to  learn,  and  now  I  'm  rather  off 
it  —  excepting  Shakespeare." 

"  You  City  men  don't  know  what  you 
are  missing,"  he  answered.  "  I  have  just 
come  from  Paternoster  Row,  where  I  have 
been  arranging  with  a  great  publisher  — 
one  of  the  greatest,  in  fact  —  for  my  next 
volume  of  poems.  Strangely  enough,  I 
saw  you  handle  a  book  of  mine  on  this 
bookstall  only  a  few  moments  ago,  and  I 
felt  drawn  to  you." 

"Then  you  are  Mr.  Martin  Tupperl" 


OF  SEVENTEEN  57 

I  exclaimed,  "  for  I  picked  up  a  book  of 
his  just  now  —  though  only  to  see  what 
was  under  it,  I  am  afraid." 

He  felt  disappointed  at  this,  but  ad- 
mitted that  I  was  right  in  my  suspicion. 

"I  am  Tupper,"  he  confessed;  "and 
though  perhaps  nobody  in  the  world  has 
more  unknown  friends,  yet  I  allow  myself 
no  intimates.  It  is  owing  to  my  terribly 
sensitive  genius.  I  read  men  like  books. 
That  is  why  I  am  talking  to  you  at  this 
moment.  My  knowledge  of  human  nature 
is  such  that  I  can  see  at  a  glance  —  I  can 
almost  feel  —  whether  a  fellow-creature  is 
predisposed  towards  me  or  not." 

"  It  is  a  great  honour  to  speak  to  you, 
Mr.  Martin  Tupper,"  I  answered.  "But 
I  'm  afraid  a  man  like  me  —  just  a  clerk 
in  a  noisy  and  booming  hive  of  industry  — 
wouldn't  be  any  good  to  you  as  a  friend. 
I  don't  know  much  about  anything  —  in 
fact,  I  am  nobody,  really;  though  I  hope 
some  day  to  be  somebody." 


58  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"  I  felt  sure  of  that,"  he  answered. 
*'  Your  reply  pleases  me  very  much,  young 
man,  because  it  indicates  that  you  are  mod- 
est but  also  plucky.  You  recognise  that 
you  have  as  yet  done  nothing,  but  your 
heart  is  high  and  you  look  forward  to  a 
time  when  you  will  do  everything.  Had 
you  read  my  Proverbial  Philosophy,  you 
would  have  discovered  that  —  however,  you 
must  read  it  —  to  please  me.  You  must 
let  me  send  you  a  copy  from  the  author." 

I  was,  of  course,  greatly  surprised  at 
such  unexpected  kindness,  but  there  was 
more  to  come. 

"  When  I  find  a  young  and  promising 
man  studying  the  books  upon  this  stall  be- 
tween the  hours  of  one  and  two  o'clock," 
said  Mr.  Tupper,  "  my  custom  is  to  ask 
him  to  join  me  at  a  modest  meal  —  lunch- 
eon, in  fact.  Now  do  not  say  that  you 
have  lunched,  or  you  will  greatly  disap- 
point me." 

Of  course  I  had  lunched,  and  yet,  in  a 


OF  SEVENTEEN  5d 

manner  of  speaking,  I  hadn't  —  not  as  a 
man  of  world-wide  fame  would  under- 
stand the  word.  To  tell  the  truth,  I  had 
felt  from  the  first  that  it  was  rather  sad  in 
a  way  —  having  to  subsist  on  a  Bath  bun 
and  a  glass  of  milk  for  so  many  hours;  and 
I  knew  that  I  never  should  get  to  feel  it 
was  a  complete  meal.  So  when  this  good 
and  celebrated  man  off-ered  me  a  luncheon, 
I  felt,  if  not  perfectly  true,  yet  it  was  true 
enough  and  not  really  dishonest  to  say  that 
I  had  not  lunched.  So  I  said  it,  and  he 
was  evidently  very  glad. 

"  We  will  go  to  the  '  Cat  on  Hot 
Bricks,'  "  he  told  me.  "  It  is  an  eating- 
house  of  no  pretension,  but  I  prefer  the 
greatest  simplicity  in  all  my  ways,  includ- 
ing my  food  and  drink.  At  the  big  res- 
taurants I  should  be  recognised,  which  is  a 
source  of  annoyance  to  me;  but  I  am  un- 
known at  the  '  Cat  on  Hot  Bricks,'  and  I 
often  take  my  steak  or  chop  and  a  pint  of 
light  ale  there,  with  other  celebrities,  and 


60  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

study  life.  Ah!  the  study  of  life,  my 
young  friend,  is  the  prince  of  pursuits! 
The  name  that  I  have  made  is  based  en- 
tirely upon  that  study.  Long  practice  has 
enabled  me  to  see  in  a  moment  the  con- 
stituents of  every  character  and  know  at  a 
glance  vrith  whom  I  have  to  deal." 

I  told  him  my  name,  and  he  said  that  he 
had  had  the  pleasure  to  meet  some  of  the 
elder  members  of  my  family  in  the  far 
past.  I  ventured  to  tell  him  about  Aunt 
Augusta  and  her  paintings,  and  he  said 
that  they  were  well  known  to  him  and  that 
he  possessed  a  good  example  of  her  genius. 
He  even  promised  to  call  upon  her  when 
next  in  that  part  of  London.  He  was 
immensely  interested  in  my  work  and 
asked  me  many  questions  concerning  fire 
insurance.  And  then  I  told  him  that  I 
hoped  in  course  of  time  to  be  an  actor, 
and  he  said  that,  next  to  the  poet,  the  actor 
was  often  the  greatest  influence  for  good. 
He   himself   had   written   a   play,    but   he 


OF  SEVENTEEN  61 

shrank  from  submitting  it  to  a  theatrical 
manager  for  production.  It  was  a  highly 
poetical  play  and  made  of  the  purest 
poetry,  and  so  delicate  that  he  feared  that 
actors  and  actresses,  unless  they  were  the 
most  famous  in  London,  might  go  and  rub 
the  bloom  off  it  and  spoil  it. 

He  let  me  choose  what  I  liked  for  lunch- 
eon, and  I  chose  steak-and-kidney  pie  and 
ginger  beer.  He  then  told  me  that  the 
steak-and-kidney  pie  was  all  right,  but 
that  the  only  profits  made  at  the  "  Cat  on 
Hot  Bricks  "  arose  from  the  liquid  refresh- 
ment, and  that  it  would  not  be  kind  or 
considerate  to  drink  so  cheap  a  drink  as 
ginger  beer.  So  he  ordered  two  bottles  of 
proper  beer,  and  then  he  told  me  about  the 
place  and  its  ways. 

"  The  Bishop  of  London  often  comes 
here  —  just  for  quiet,"  he  said.  "  Of 
course  I  know  him,  and  we  have  a  chat 
sometimes,  about  religion  and  poetrj^  and 
so  on.     And  the  Dean  of  St.  Paul's  will 


62  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

drop  in  now  and  then.  He  has  a  weakness 
for  '  lark  pudding  '  —  a  very  famous  dish 
here.  They  have  it  on  Wednesdays  only. 
Now  tell  me  about  your  theatrical  ambi- 
tions, for  I  may  be  able  to  help  you  in  that 
matter." 

I  told  him  all  about  my  hopes,  and  he 
said  that  one  of  his  few  personal  friends 
was  Mr.  Wilson  Barrett,  of  the  Princess's 
Theatre  in  Oxford  Street. 

"  That  great  genius,  Mr.  Booth,  from 
America,  has  been  acting  Shakespeare 
there  lately,"  I  said. 

"He  has,"  answered  Mr.  Tupper;  "his 
*  Lear '  is  stupendous.  I  know  him  well, 
for  he  often  recites  my  poems  at  benefit 
matinees.  But  Wilson  "  (in  this  amazingly 
familiar  way  he  referred  to  the  great  JNIr. 
Wilson  Barrett)  "  is  always  on  the  lookout 
for  promising  young  fellows  to  join  his 
company,  and  walk  on  with  the  crowds,  and 
so  learn  the  rudiments  of  stage  education 
and  become  familiar  with  the  boards.     He 


OF  SEVENTEEN  63 

is  anxious  to  get  a  superior  set  of  young 
fellows  on  to  the  stage,  and  he  often  comes 
to  me,  because  he  knows  that  in  the  circles 
wherein  I  move  the  young  men  are  intel- 
lectual and  have  high  opinions  about  the 
honour  of  the  actor's  calling." 

"  It  would  be  a  glorious  beginning  for  a 
young  man,"  I  said,  "  but,  of  course,  such 
good  things  are  not  for  me." 

Mr.  Tupper  appeared  to  be  buried  in  his 
own  thoughts  for  a  time.  When  he  spoke 
again,  he  had  changed  the  subject. 

"  Will  you  have  another  plate  of  steak- 
and-kidney  pie?"  he  asked,  and  I  con- 
sented with  many  thanks. 

Then  he  returned  to  the  great  subject 
of  the  stage. 

"  Only  yesterday,"  he  said,  "  I  was 
spending  half  an  hour  in  dear  old  Wilson's 
private  room  at  the  Princess's  Theatre. 
He  likes  me  to  drop  in  between  the  acts. 
He  is  a  man  who  would  always  rather  listen 
than  talk;  and,  if  he  has  to  talk,  he  chooses 


64  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

any  subject  rather  than  himself  and  his  his- 
trionic powers.  All  the  greatest  actors  are 
the  same.  They  are  almost  morbid  about 
mentioning  their  personal  talents,  or  the 
parts  they  have  played.  But  the  subjects 
that  always  interest  Wilson  are  the  younger 
men  and  the  future  of  the  drama.  '  Mar- 
tin,' he  said  to  me,  '  I  would  throw  up  the 
lead  in  my  own  theatre  to-night,  if  I  could 
by  so  doing  reveal  a  new  and  great  genius 
to  the  world!  I  would  gladly  play  sub- 
ordinate parts,  if  I  could  find  a  young  man 
to  play  my  parts  better  than  I  do  myself.' 
I  tell  you  this,  INIr.  Corkey,  to  show  you 
that  one  supreme  artist,  at  least,  is  always 
on  the  lookout  for  talent,  always  ready  to 
stretch  a  helping  hand  to  the  tyro." 

"  Perhaps  some  day,"  I  said,  "  years 
hence,  of  course,  when  I  have  learned  elo- 
cution and  stage  deportment  and  got  the 
general  hang  of  the  thing,  you  would  be 
so  very  generous  and  kind  as  to  give  me  a 
letter  of  introduction  to  Mr.  Barrett?'* 


OF  SEVENTEEN  65 

My.  Tupper  filled  my  glass  with  more 
beer  and  sank  his  voice  to  a  confidential 
whisper. 

"  I  could  n't  '  give  '  you  an  introduction, 
Mr.  Corkey,  because  Wilson  himself  would 
not  allow  that.  I  am,  of  course,  enor- 
mously rich,  but  it  is  always  understood  be- 
tween me  and  the  great  tragedian  that  I 
get  some  little  honorarium  for  these  intro- 
ductions. Personally,  I  do  not  want  any 
such  thing;  but  he  feels  that  a  nominal  sum 
of  three  to  five  guineas  ought  to  pass  be- 
fore young  fellows  are  lifted  to  the  im- 
mense privilege  of  his  personal  acquaint- 
ance, and  enabled  actually  to  tread  the 
boards  with  him  in  some  of  his  most  im- 
passioned creations.  The  money  I  give  to 
the  Home  for  Decayed  Gentlewomen  at 
Newington  Butts  —  in  which  I  am  deeply 
interested.  Thus,  you  see,  these  introduc- 
tions to  Mr.  Wilson  Barrett  serve  two 
great  ends:  they  advance  the  cause  of  the 
Decayed    Gentlewomen  —  the    number    of 


66  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

whom  would  much  distress  you  to  learn  — 
and  they  enable  the  asi)irant  to  theatrical 
honours  to  begin  his  career  imder  the  most 
promising  circumstances  that  it  is  possible 
to  conceive." 

"But  I  ought  to  go  through  the  mill, 
like  Mr.  Barrett  himself  and  JNIr.  Henry 
Irving  and  all  famous  actors  have  done,"  I 
said;  and  Mr.  Tupper  agreed  with  me. 

"  Have  no  fear  for  that,"  he  answered. 
"  Wilson  will  see  to  that.  He  is  more  than 
strict  and,  while  allowing  reasonable  free- 
dom for  the  expansion  of  individual  genius, 
will  take  very  good  care  you  have  severe 
training  and  plenty  of  hard  work.  But  the 
point  is  that  you  must  go  through  his  mill 
and  not  another's.  It  is  no  good  going  to 
Wilson  after  some  lesser  man  has  taught 
you  to  speak  and  walk  and  act.  You  would 
only  have  to  imlearn  these  things.  If  you 
want  to  flourish  in  his  school  of  tragedy, 
which  is,  of  course,  the  most  famous  in 
England  at  the  moment,  you  must  go  to 


OF  SEVENTEEN  67 

him,  as  it  were,  empty  —  a  blank  sheet  — 
a  virgin  page  whereon  he  can  impress  his 
great  principles.  Will  you  have  apple 
tart,  plum  tart,  or  tapioca  pudding  and 
Surrey  cream? " 

I  took  apple  tart,  but  Mr.  Tupper  said 
that  sweet  dishes  were  fatal  to  the  working 
of  his  mind  in  poetical  invention,  so  he  had 
celery  and  cheese. 

"  I  see  Wilson  to-night,"  he  resumed. 
"  To  be  quite  frank,  I  have  to  tell  him 
about  a  lad  who  is  very  anxious  to  join  him, 
and  wishes  to  give  me  fifty  pounds  for  the 
introduction;  but  such  is  my  strange  gift 
of  intuition  in  these  cases,  that  I  would  far 
rather  introduce  you  to  the  theatre  than 
the  youth  in  question.  You  are  clearly  in 
earnest  and  I  doubt  if  he  is.  You  have  a 
theatrical  personality  and  he  has  not. 
Your  voice  is  well  suited  for  the  higher 
drama;  his  is  a  cockney  voice  and  will  al- 
ways place  him  at  a  disadvantage  save  in 
comedy.    Had  it  been  in  your  power  to  go 


08  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

before  AVilson  this  week,  I  should  have 
substituted  your  name  for  the  other.  I 
wish  cordially  there  were  no  sordid  ques- 
tion of  money.  I  would  even  advance  j'^ou 
five  guineas  myself.  But  you  are  as  deli- 
cate-minded as  I  am.  You  would  not  like 
me  to  do  that." 

I  assured  him  that  such  a  thing  was  out 
of  the  question. 

"  Indeed,  Mr.  Tupper,"  I  said,  "  you 
are  doing  far,  far  more  than  I  should  ever 
have  thought  anybody  would  do  for  a  per- 
fect stranger.  And  unless  I  could  pay  the 
money  for  the  decayed  Home,  I  should 
not  dream  of  accepting  such  a  great  kind- 
ness." 

He  was  quite  touched.  He  blew  his 
nose. 

"  We  artists,"  he  said,  "  are  emotional. 
There  is  a  magic  power  in  us  to  find  all 
that  is  trusting  and  good  and  of  sweet 
savour  in  human  nature.  And  yet  goodness 
and  gratitude  and  proper   feeling   in  the 


OF  SEVENTEEN  69 

young  alwaj'^s  move  me,  as  you  see  me 
moved  now.     They  are  so  rare." 

He  brought  out  a  brown  leather  purse 
and  took  from  it  half  a  sovereign.  He 
then  called  the  waiter  and  paid  the  bill. 

"  We  will  go  do^vn  into  the  smoking- 
room,"  he  said.  "  No  doubt  a  liqueur  will 
not  be  amiss." 

I'd  forgotten  all  about  the  time  and,  in 
fact,  everything  else  in  the  world  during 
this  fearfully  exciting  meeting  with  Mr. 
Martin  Tupper;  and  the  end  of  it  all  was 
that  I  fished  out  my  first  five-pound  note 
for  the  introduction  to  ]Mr.  Barrett  and 
my  first  step  on  the  stage. 

"  It  should  be  guineas,"  said  Mr.  Tup- 
per, "  but  in  your  case,  and  because  I  have 
taken  a  very  great  personal  fancy  to  you, 
it  shall  be  pounds.  And  don't  grudge  the 
money.  Go  on  your  way  happy  in  the 
knowledge  that  it  will  greatly  gladden  a 
life  that  has  a  distinctly  seamy  side.  There 
is  a  sad  but  courageous  woman  whose  eyes 


70  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

will  brighten  when  she  sees  this  piece  of 
paper." 

But  though  he  idly  threw  my  note  into 
his  pocket  as  a  thing  of  no  account,  yet  he 
was  a  man  of  the  most  honourable  and  sen- 
sitive nature. 

"  I  cannot,"  he  said,  "  leave  you  without 
carrying  out  my  part  of  the  contract.  I 
gather  that  you  are  rather  pressed  for  time, 
or  I  would  drive  you  to  the  Princess's 
Theatre  in  my  private  brougham,  which  is 
waiting  for  me  near  the  INIansion  House. 
No  doubt  the  driver  thinks  I  am  lunching 
with  the  Lord  Mayor,  as  I  often  do.  But 
to  take  you  just  now  to  the  Princess's 
Theatre  would  interfere  with  your  duties 
at  the  Apollo  Fire  Office,  which  I  should 
be  the  last  to  wish  to  do;  so  I  will  write 
you  a  personal  introduction  to  my  dear 
friend,  Mr.  Barrett,  and  j^ou  can  deliver  it, 
either  to-niglit  or  on  the  next  occasion  that 
you  go  to  see  him  act." 

"  It  will  be  to-night,"  I  said. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  71 

He  refused  to  go  until  his  part  was  done. 

"  We  must  avoid  even  the  appearance  of 
evil,"  he  told  me.  "  You  might  feel  uneasy 
and  suspicious  were  I  to  leave  you  with 
nothing  but  a  promise.  Martin  Tupper's 
word  is  as  good  as  his  oath,  I  believe;  but 
it  is  a  hard,  a  cold,  and  a  cruel  world.  At 
any  rate,  you  shall  have  the  letter." 

He  opened  his  bag,  which  contained 
writing  materials,  and  he  had  soon  written 
a  note  to  Mr.  Barrett,  warmly  commending 
me  to  the  attention  of  that  great  man.  He 
made  me  read  it,  and  I  was  surprised  how 
well  he  had  summed  up  my  character.  He 
next  gave  me  his  own  address,  which  was 
No.  96  Grosvenor  Square  —  one  of  the 
most  fashionable  residential  neighbourhoods 
in  London  —  and  then,  hoping  that  I 
would  dine  with  him  and  Mrs.  Tupper  two 
nights  later,  at  8  o'clock,  he  shook  me 
warmly  by  the  hand,  wished  me  good  luck, 
and  left  me. 

I  saw  his  dignified  figure  steal  into  the 


72  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

street,  and  though  the  general  public  did 
not  seem  to  recognise  him  in  his  modest 
attire,  I  fancy  that  a  policeman  or  two  cast 
understanding  glances  at  him.  No  doubt 
they  had  seen  him  before  —  at  royal  or 
other  functions. 

I  seemed  to  be  walking  on  air  when  I 
went  back  to  work,  for  this  great  man,  in- 
spired by  nothing  but  pure  goodwill,  had, 
as  it  were,  opened  the  door  of  success  to  me 
and  given  me  a  chance  for  which  thousands 
and  thousands  of  young  professional  actors 
must  have  sighed  in  vain.  He  was  hardly 
the  man  I  should  have  chosen  to  know; 
but  now  that  I  did  know  him,  I  felt  that  it 
must  have  been  a  special  Providence  that 
had  done  it.  I  wished  that  I  could  make 
it  up  to  him  and  hoped  that  he  would  live 
long  enough  for  me  to  send  him  free 
tickets  to  see  me  act.  INIeantime,  I  deter- 
mined to  buy  all  his  books,  which  was  the 
least  I  could  do. 

But  I  was  brought  down  to  earth  rather 


OF  SEVENTEEN  73 

rudely  from  these  beautiful  thoughts,  for 
when  I  got  back  to  the  office,  Mr.  Blades 
told  me  that  Mr.  Westonshaugh  wished  to 
speak  to  me;  and  it  then  transpired  that, 
instead  of  taking  half  an  hour  for  my  lunch- 
eon, according  to  the  rules  and  regulations 
of  the  Apollo,  I  had  been  out  for  two  hours 
and  rather  more! 

I  was  terribly  sorry,  and  felt  the  right 
and  proper  thing  was  to  be  quite  plain 
with  Mr.  Westonshaugh. 

*'  I  met  Mr.  Martin  Tupper  at  a  book- 
stall, and  he  introduced  himself  and  asked 
me  to  lunch,  sir,"  I  said.  But  the  Head 
of  the  Department  did  not  like  this  at  all, 
and  I  was  a  good  deal  distressed  to  find 
the  spirit  in  which  he  took  it.  He  seemed 
pained  and  startled  by  what  I  told  him; 
he  even  showed  a  great  disinclination  to 
accept  my  word. 

"  Go  back  to  your  work,  sir,"  he  said,  in 
a  very  stern  voice,  "  and  don't  add  buffoon- 
ery  to   your    other    irregularities.      I    am 


74  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

much   disappointed   in  j^oii,   Mr.    Corkey." 

It  was  a  fearful  thing  to  hear  this  great 
and  good  man  misunderstand  me  so  com- 
pletely. In  fact,  the  blood  of  shame  sprang 
to  my  forehead  —  a  thing  that  had  never 
happened  before.  And  then  he  made  an- 
other even  more  terrible  speech. 

"  You  look  to  me  very  much  as  if  you'd 
been  drinking,"  he  said.  "  Have  a  care, 
young  man;  for  if  there  is  one  thing  that 
will  ruin  your  future  more  quickly  than 
another,  it  is  that  disgusting  offense!" 

I  sneaked  away  then,  in  a  state  of  be- 
wildered grief,  sorrowful  repentance,  and 
mournful  exasperation.  This  was  by  far 
the  unhappiest  event  in  my  life;  and  things 
got  worse  and  worse  as  the  day  wore  on. 

Mr.  Blades  asked  me  what  the  deuce 
I  'd  been  doing,  and  when  I  told  him,  he 
said  "  Rats!  "  This  was  a  word  he  used  to 
mean  scorn.  Then  he  continued,  and  even 
used  French. 

"'Martin    Tupper!'      Why    don't    you 


OF  SEVENTEEN  75 

say  it  was  Martin  Luther  at  once?  I  be- 
lieve it 's  a  case  of  '  Sasshay  la  fam! 

"  Martin  Luther  died  in  1546,  so  it 
could  n't  have  been  him,  and  I  don't  know 
what  '  Sasshay  la  fam '  means,"  I  said, 
and  Mr.  Blades  replied  in  a  most  startling 
manner : 

**  So  's  Martin  Tupper  dead  —  sure  to 
be!  Ages  ago,  no  doubt.  Anyway,  I  hap- 
pen to  know  that  Mr.  Westonshaugh  thinks 
the  dickens  of  a  lot  of  him,  so  when  you 
said  he  'd  been  standing  you  a  lunch,  you 
made  the  worst  joke  you  could  have." 

"  It  was  n't  a  joke,  but  quite  the  re- 
verse," I  said;  and  then  I  told  Mr.  Blades 
how  I  had  an  introduction  to  Mr.  Wilson 
Barrett  at  that  moment  in  my  pocket  —  to 
prove  the  truth  of  what  I  was  saying. 

Mr.  Blades  read  it  carefully  and  shook 
his  head. 

"  You  're  such  a  jug,  Corkey,"  he  said. 
"  This  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  a  com- 
mon or  garden  confidence  trick.    The  beg- 


76  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

gar  saw  you  had  a  '  fiver  '  at  the  bookstall 
and  soon  found  you  were  a  soft  thmg. 
Then  he  pretended  to  be  friendly  and  just 
hammered  away  till  he  found  the  weak 
spot.  If  you  'd  go  and  have  a  sensible 
lunch,  like  everybody  else,  instead  of  wan- 
dering about  London  in  the  helpless  way 
you  do,  on  a  bun  and  a  glass  of  milk,  this 
would  n't  have  happened." 

"  The  great  point  is  whether  ^Ir.  Tupper 
is  or  is  not  dead,"  I  told  Mr.  Blades.  "  If 
he  is  dead,  really  and  truly,  then  no  doubt 
I  have  been  swindled  by  a  shady  character; 
but  if  he  is  not,  then  there  is  still  hope  that 
it  was  really  him." 

Mr.  Blades,  with  his  accustomed  great 
kindness,  himself  went  in  to  Mr.  Weston- 
shaugh  with  me  and  explained  the  painful 
situation  in  some  well-chosen  words. 

"  I  should  n't  have  thought  of  using  the 
name  of  such  a  world-renowned  poet,  sir," 
I  said  to  the  Head  of  the  Department; 
**  but  he  told  me  so  himself,  and  he  was 


OF  SEVENTEEN  77 

exceedingly  serious-looking  and  solemn  and 
kind ;  and  far  above  clean  clothe:^  —  which 
is  a  common  thing  with  poets.  But,  of 
course,  if  he 's  dead,  as  Mr.  Blades 
thinks " 

*'  He 's  not  dead,"  answered  the  Chief. 
"  I  am  glad  to  say  that  he  is  not  dead.  It 
is  my  privilege  to  correspond  with  Mr. 
Tupper  occasionally.  I  heard  from  him 
on  the  subject  of  a  difficult  passage  in  one 
of  his  poems  only  a  month  ago." 

"  Does  he  live  in  Grosvenor  Square,  sir?  " 
I  asked;  "  because  this  Mr.  Tupper  said  he 
did  —  at  No.  96." 

"  He  does  not,"  answered  Mr.  Weston- 
shaugh.  "  He  does  n't  live  in  London  at 
all." 

Then  Mr.  Blades  had  a  brilliant 
idea. 

"  Would  you  know  Mr.  Tupper's  hand- 
writing, sir? "  he  asked,  and  Mr.  Weston- 
shaugh  said  that  he  would  know  it  in- 
stantly. 


78  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

He  examined,  the  letter  of  introduction 
to  Mr.  Barrett,  and  pronounced  it  to  be 
an  unquestionable  forgery. 

"  A  great  crime  has  been  committed," 
he  said.  "  A  professional  thief  has  used 
the  name  and  signature  of  Mr.  Tupper  in 
order  to  rob  you  of  five  pounds,  and  he  has 
succeeded  only  too  well.  Let  this  be  a 
lesson  to  you,  Mr.  Corkey,  not  again  to 
fall  into  conversation  with  the  first  well- 
dressed  —  or  badly  dressed  —  stranger  who 
may  accost  you.  To  think  that  the  inso- 
lent scoundrel  dared  to  use  that  sacred 
name! " 

Mr.  Westonshaugh  evidently  considered 
it  a  very  much  worse  thing  to  forge  Martin 
Tupper's  name  than  to  steal  my  five-pound 
note.  And  I  dare  say  it  was.  He  forgave 
me,  however,  and  withdrew  his  dreadful 
hint  about  my  having  had  too  much  to 
drink. 

Then  I  left  him  and  worked  in  a  very 


OF  SEVENTEEN  79 

miserable  frame  of  mind  until  six  o'clock  — 
to  make  up  for  my  wasted  time. 

It  was  my  earliest  great  and  complete 
crusher;  and,  coming  just  at  this  critical 
moment,  made  it  simply  beastly  sad.  Be- 
cause my  very  first  earnings  were  com- 
pletely swallowed  up  in  this  nefarious  man- 
ner by  a  shady  customer.  I  had  hoped  to 
return  home  and  flourish  my  five-pound 
note  in  the  face  of  Aunt  Augusta  and  tell 
her  to  help  herself  liberally  out  of  it;  but, 
instead  of  that,  I  had  to  horrify  her  with 
the  bad  news  that  my  money  was  gone  for 
ever.  If  it  had  happened  later,  I  believe 
that  I  should  have  made  less  and  even  felt 
less  of  it;  but  such  fearful  luck  falling  on 
my  very  first  "  fiver  "  made  it  undoubtedly 
harder  to  bear  than  it  otherwise  would 
have  been.  And  then  I  got  a  sort  of 
gloomy  idea  that  losing  my  first  honest 
earnings  meant  a  sort  of  curse  on  every- 
thing I  might  make  in  after  life!  I  felt 
that  a  bad  start  like  that  might  dog  me 


80  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

for  j^ears,  if  not  for  ever.  I  had  a  curious 
and  horrid  dread  that  I  should  never  really 
make  up  this  great  loss,  but  alwaj^s  be  five 
pounds  short  through  the  rest  of  my  career 
to  my  dying  day! 

Aunt  Augusta  tried  hard  to  make  light 
of  it.  In  fact,  it  is  undoubtedly  at  times 
like  this  that  a  woman  is  far  more  comfort- 
ing than  a  man.  She  went  to  her  private 
store  and  brought  out  another  crisp  and 
clean  five-pound  note  and  made  me  take  it. 
She  insisted,  and  so  reluctantly  I  took  it; 
but  I  did  n't  spend  it  in  the  least  with  the 
joy  and  ease  that  I  should  have  spent  the 
other.  It  was,  in  fact,  merely  a  gift  — 
good  enough  in  its  way  —  but  very  differ- 
ent from  the  one  I  had  earned,  single- 
handed,  by  hard  work,  in  a  humming  hive 
of  industry. 

The  whole  thing  had  its  funny  side  —  to 
other  people,  and  I  heard  a  good  deal  about 
it  at  the  Apollo  Fire  Ofiice.  In  fact,  I 
must  have  done  the  real  Martin  Tuj^per  a 


OF  SEVENTEEN  81 

good  turn  in  a  way,  because  it  was  the 
fashion  for  everybody  to  quote  from  his 
improving  works  when  I  passed  by. 

It  was  a  great  lesson  all  round;  but 
London  is  full  of  interesting  things  of  this 
sort. 


I  WAS  too  much  hurt  about  the  insult 
offered  Mr.  Wilson  Barrett  and  my- 
self to  go  and  see  him  act  again  for  a 
long  time ;  but  other  theatres  demanded  my 
attention  because  I  was  now  a  regular 
student  of  the  drama  and  didn't  like  to 
miss  anything.  Sometimes  I  went  alone 
and  sometimes  I  got  a  clerk  from  the 
Apollo  to  go  with  me.  But  none  of  them 
much  cared  about  legitimate  drama. 

I  was  already  deeply  in  love,  in  a  far- 
distant  and  hopeless  sort  of  way,  with  Miss 
Ellen  Terry,  and  when  there  came  a  first 
night  at  the  Lyceum  Theatre,  I  resolved 
to  be  present  in  the  pit.  I  told  Aunt 
Augusta  not  to  expect  me  at  dinner-time, 
but  she  was  well  used  to  this  and  said  she 
would  n't.  So  the  moment  that  I  was  free 
from  my  appointed  task  I  flew  off  to  the 


THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN     83 

Lyceum  pit  door  and  took  my  place.  I 
was,  however,  by  no  means  the  first  to 
arrive.  A  crowd  had  already  collected  and 
I  found  myself  among  that  hardy  and 
famous  race  of  men  and  women  known  as 
"  first-nighters."  There  were  even  young- 
ish girls  in  the  crowd,  for  one  stood  near 
me  reading  the  Merchant  of  Venice,  which 
was  the  play  we  had  all  come  to  see.  Luck- 
ily for  the  girl  a  gas-lamp  hung  over  her 
head  and  she  was  thus  enabled  to  read  the 
play  and  pass  the  time.  Like  a  fool  I  had 
brought  nothing,  yet  it  was  enough  amuse- 
ment and  instruction  for  me  to  be  among 
so  many  regular  professional  "  first  night- 
ers";  and  I  listened  with  great  interest  to 
their  deep  knowledge  of  the  subject.  Five 
or  six  men  of  all  ages  evidently  knew  one 
another,  and  they  were  talking  about  a 
little  book  that  had  just  been  written  on 
Mr.  Henry  Irving  by  Mr.  William  Archer. 
It  was  a  very  startling  book  —  the  very  one, 
in  fact,  that  I  was  going  to  buy  at  the  book- 


84,  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

stall  when  the  shady  customer  pretended 
he  was  -Mr.  JNIartin  Tapper.  It  was  a 
small  book  with  rather  a  grim  picture  of 
]Mr.  Henry  Irving  on  the  outside,  and  I 
found  that  these  old  hands  of  the  stage  did 
not  altogether  approve  of  the  book  and 
thought  parts  of  it  rather  strong  coming 
from  Mr.  Archer  to  ]Mr.  Irving. 

"  He  says  that  Irving  is  half  a  woman," 
said  a  grey  man.  "  Now  that 's  going  too 
far,  in  my  opinion." 

"  I  know  what  he  's  driving  at,"  answered 
a  young  man  with  a  very  intellectual  face. 
"  You  see,  every  artist  has  got  to  be  man, 
woman,  and  child  rolled  into  one.  Every 
great  artist  has  to  have  the  imagination  and 
power  of  feeling  and  fellow-feeling  to 
identify  himself  w^ith  every  other  sort  of 
possible  person.  If  you  can't  do  that,  you 
can't  be  a  first-class  actor.  That 's  where 
Irving  beats  Barrett  into  a  cocked  hat  — 
temperament  and  power  of  imagination. 
Irving  could  act  anything  —  from  Richard 


OF  SEVENTEEN  85 

the  Third  to  an  infant  in  arms;  Barrett 
could  not." 

"  Barrett  very  nearly  made  Hamlet  an 
infant  in  arms,  all  the  same,"  said  the  grey 
man,  and  at  this  excellent  and  subtle  joke 
they  all  laughed.  I  wanted  to  laugh  in  an 
admiring  sort  of  way,  but  doubted  whether 
it  would  not  be  rather  interfering.  So  I 
contented  myself  with  smiling  heartily; 
because  I  did  n't  want  them  to  think  so 
fine  a  joke  had  been  lost  upon  me. 

They  were  very  deeply  read  in  every- 
thing to  do  with  the  theatre,  and  I  found 
that  they  knew  most  of  the  actresses  by 
their  married  names,  which,  of  course,  I  did 
not.  Thus,  greatly  to  my  surprise,  I  found 
out  that  nearly  all  the  most  fascinating  and 
famous  actresses  were  married.  Many 
even  had  families. 

Splendid  stories  were  told  by  the  grey 
man.  He  related  a  great  jest  about  Mr. 
William  Terriss  when  he  was  acting  with 
Mr.  Irving.    It  was  irreverent  in  a  way  to 


86  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

such  a  famous  actor  as  Mr.  Terriss;  but,  of 
course,  for  mere  intellectual  power  Mr. 
Terriss  was  not  in  it  with  IMr.  Irving  — 
any  more  than  any  other  actor  was,  though 
he  might,  none  the  less,  be  very  great  in 
himself.  And  once,  when  Mr.  Terriss  was 
rehearsing  with  JNIr.  Irving,  the  latter,  fail- 
ing to  make  the  former  do  what  he  wanted, 
said  before  the  actors,  actresses,  and  super- 
numeraries at  that  time  assembled  on  the 
spacious  boards  of  the  Lyceum  Theatre  — 
he  said,  "  My  dear  Terriss,  do  try  and  use 
the    little    brains    that    God    has    given 

you!" 

The  hours  rolled  by  and  one  or  two  of 
the  young  men  spoke  kindly  to  me.  Then 
the  girl,  who  had  grey  eyes  and  a  mass  of 
yellow  hair  under  a  deer-stalker  hat,  and 
was  dressed  in  cloth  of  the  same  kind,  also 
spoke  to  me  and  asked  me  to  take  my 
elbow  out  of  her  shoulder-blade.  I  apolo- 
gised instantly  and  altered  my  position. 
The  crush  was  now  increasing  and  the  air 


OF  SEVENTEEN  87 

was  exceedingly  stuffy;  but  there  still  re- 
mained an  hour  before  the  doors  opened. 

Having  broken  the  ice,  the  girl,  who  I 
think  was  tired  of  keeping  quiet  for  such  a 
long  time,  began  to  talk.  We  discussed 
the  drama  and  "  first  nights  "  in  general. 
From  one  thing  we  went  to  another  and 
I  found,  much  to  my  interest,  that  the  girl 
intended  to  become  an  actress.  She  was  an 
independent  and  courageous  sort  of  girl. 
Her  parents  had  a  shop  in  the  Edgware 
Road  and  were  very  much  against  her 
going  on  the  stage;  but  she  was  determined 
to  defy  them.  There  was  to  be  a  dramatic 
school  opened  shortly,  and  she  was  going 
to  join  it.  Then  I  naturally  told  her  that 
I  was  going  to  join  that  school  too,  and  she 
was  quite  pleased. 

"  Perhaps  we  shall  play  parts  in  the 
same  play  some  day,"  she  said;  and  I 
said  I  hoped  we  might. 

"Phew!"  she  exclaimed  presently. 
"  This  is  getting  a  bit  thick,  isn't  it?" 


88  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Certainly  it  was.  I  had  never  been  in 
such  a  tightly  packed  crowd  and,  as  bad 
luck  would  have  it,  I  was  beginning  to 
feel  very  uncomfortable.  I  was,  in  plain 
words,  starving.  Like  a  fool  I  had  spared 
no  time  for  tea,  but  rushed  off  at  the 
earliest  possible  moment,  and  now  I  began 
to  feel  emptier  than  I  had  ever  felt  in  my 
life  before. 

The  girl,  to  whom  I  mentioned  this,  said 
that  I  had  gone  white  as  chalk,  but  that  I 
should  be  able  to  buy  something  to  eat  and 
drink  inside.  She  had  some  chocolate  in 
her  pocket,  fortunately,  and  with  great 
generosity  insisted  upon  sharing  it  with 
me;  but  it  amounted  really  to  nothing  in 
my  ravenous  state.  It  was  like  giving  a 
hungry  tiger  a  shrimp. 

And  then  a  most  extraordinary  thing 
ha])pcned  —  a  thing  that  I  should  not 
have  l)elieved  possible.  I  began  to  feel 
funnier  and  funnier,  and  to  gasp  in  a  very 
fishlike  way,  and  to  feel  a  cold  and  horrid 


OF  SEVENTEEN  89 

sweat  bursting  out  upon  my  forehead.  I 
had  not  felt  hke  this  for  many,  many  years 
—  in  fact,  only  once  before :  on  the  day  that 
I  and  Jackson  Minor  found  a  cigar  at 
Merivale  and  tossed  for  it  and  I  won  and 
smoked  the  cigar  secretly  to  the  stump. 
And  I  remembered  now,  with  tragical 
horror,  what  happened  afterwards;  and  the 
hideous  thought  came  to  me  that  I  was 
going  to  be  ill  in  that  seething  crowd  of 
hardy  old  "first-nighters"!  Think  of  the 
disgrace  and  shame  of  it ;  and  it  was  n't 
only  that,  because,  of  course,  the  "  first- 
nighters  "  would  never  forget  a  horrible 
adventure  of  that  kind,  and  no  doubt  the 
next  time  I  presented  myself  among  them, 
to  wait  five  or  six  hours  before  the  doors 
opened  upon  some  great  triumph  of  Thes- 
pian art,  they  would  recognise  me  and  band 
together  against  me  and  order  me  away,  as 
a  man  unfit  to  take  his  place  among  sea- 
soned critics  of  the  drama. 

All  this  and  much  more  flashed  through 


90  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

my  head  and  then,  just  before  the  climax, 
tliere  came  the  comforting  thought  that  I 
could  n't  be  ill  in  that  way,  having  had  noth- 
ing since  my  bun  and  glass  of  milk  eight 
hours  before.  I  am  sorry  to  keep  on  men- 
tioning this  bun  and  glass  of  milk  because  it 
sounds  greedy,  but  for  once  in  a  way  I  was 
glad  that  I  was  empty  —  for  the  sake  of 
all  those  artistic  and  courageous  "  first- 
nighters,"  not  to  mention  the  brave,  grey- 
eyed  girl. 

Then  I  felt  my  knees  give  and  the  gas- 
light overhead  whirled  about  like  a  comet 
with  twenty  tails;  I  saw  the  heads  of  the 
people  round  me  fade  off  their  shoulders; 
the  gaslight  went  out;  I  heard  a  tremen- 
dous humming  and  roaring  in  my  ears, 
like  a  train  in  a  tunnel,  and  all  was  over. 
My  last  thought  was  that  this  was  death, 
and  I  wondered  if  INIiss  Ellen  Terry  would 
read  about  it  in  the  paper  next  day  and  be 
sorry.  But,  even  at  that  ghastly  moment, 
I    knew   she   wouldn't,   because   of   course 


OF  SEVENTEEN  91 

she  would  want  to  hear  what  the  critics 
thought  of  her  "Portia";  and  that  would 
naturally  be  the  principal  thing  in  the 
newspaper  for  her. 

Of  course  I  wasn't  dying  really;  but  I 
fainted  and  must  have  put  a  great  many 
people  to  fearful  inconvenience.  It  shows, 
however,  what  jolly  good  hearts  "  first- 
nighters  "  have  got,  in  my  opinion,  that 
they  did  n't  merely  let  me  sink  to  the 
earth,  and  ignore  me,  and  walk  over  me 
when  the  doors  opened.  But  far  from 
that,  despite  the  length  of  my  legs,  they 
lugged  me  out  somehow  and  forced  open 
the  side  door  of  a  public-house  that  was 
close  at  hand,  and  thrust  me  in. 

When  I  came  to,  my  first  instinct  was 
one  of  pure  self-preservation  and  I  asked 
for  food.  Outside,  the  people  were  crush- 
ing into  the  pit  of  the  theatre,  and  by  the 
time  I  had  eaten  about  a  loaf  and  half  a 
Dutch  cheese,  and  drunk  some  weak 
brandy-and-water,    which   the   landlord   of 


92  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

the  public-house  very  kindly  and  humanely 
insisted  upon  my  doing,  the  i^it  was  full — 
not  even  standing  room  remained.  It  was 
rather  sad  in  a  way;  but  I  felt  less  for  the 
frightful  disappointment,  after  waiting  all 
those  hours,  than  for  the  debt  I  owed  the 
merciful  men  who  had  rescued  me.  Of 
course  I  did  n't  know  who  they  might  be 
and,  in  any  case,  it  was  impossible  to  wait 
there  till  midnight,  on  the  off-chance  of 
seeing  them  after  the  play  was  over  and 
thanking  them  gratefully. 

I  could  have  kicked  myself  over  it,  be- 
cause for  a  chap  nearly  six  feet  high,  about 
to  join  the  London  Athletic  Club  and 
going  to  be  an  actor  some  day  and  so  on 
—  for  such  a  chap,  with  his  way  to  make 
in  the  world,  to  go  into  a  crowd  and  faint, 
like  a  footling  schoolgirl  who  cuts  her 
finger  —  it  was  right  bang  off,  as  they  say. 
I  felt  fearfully  downcast  about  it,  because 
it  looked  to  me  as  if  my  career  might  just 
as  well  be  closed  there  and  then:  but  the 


OF  SEVENTEEN  93 

kind  landlord  rather  cheered  me  up.  He 
said: 

"  You  need  n't  take  on  like  that.  No 
doubt  you  Ve  outgrown  your  strength. 
It 's  nothing  at  all.  The  air  out  there  in 
these  crushes  would  choke  a  crow.  It 's 
the  commonest  thing  in  the  world  for  peo- 
ple to  be  dragged  out  and  shot  in  that 
door." 

"  Women,  I  dare  say  —  not  men." 

"  Women  —  and  boys,"  he  answered. 
*' And  what  d' you  call  yourself?" 

"  Well,  I  'm  a  man,  I  suppose,"  I  re- 
plied. "  I  'm  earning  my  own  living,  any- 
way." 

"  So  did  I  —  afore  I  was  ten  years  old, 
my  bold  hero!"  said  the  landlord. 

He  talked  to  me,  while  I  ate  my  bread 
and  cheese,  and  presently  advised  me  to 
take  a  cab  and  drive  home;  but  this  I 
scorned  to  do,  being  perfectly  fit  again. 
I  said  I  hoped  to  see  him  once  more  some 
day  and  he  only  took  sixpence  for  all  my 


94  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

refreshment.  He  was  a  good  man  and  I 
felt  jolly  obliged  to  him  —  especially  when 
he  told  me  that  my  faint  was  not  a  dis- 
grace in  itself,  but  more  in  the  nature  of  a 
misfortune. 

I  walked  home  and  said  nothing  about 
this  unfortunate  event;  but  merely  told 
Aunt  Augusta  that  I  had  not  been  able 
to  get  into  the  Lyceum,  which  was  the 
strict  truth  and  no  more.  For  if  I  had  re- 
vealed to  her  about  fainting  she  would  have 
fussed  me  to  death  and  very  likely  made 
me  go  to  Harley  Street  in  grim  earnest 
and  not  merely  as  a  spectator  of  that 
famous  spot. 

Two  nights  later  I  went  to  the  Lyceum 
again  and  waited  three  hours,  and  being 
laden  in  every  pocket  with  sausage  rolls, 
mince  pies,  and  fat,  sustaining  pieces  of 
chocolate,  simply  laughed  at  the  waiting. 
However,  it  was  a  lesson  in  its  way;  and 
the  lesson  was  never  to  be  hungry  in  Lon- 
don.   It  is  the  worst  place  in  the  world  to 


OF  SEVENTEEN  95 

be  hungry  in  —  owing  to  the  great  strain 
on  the  nerves,  no  doubt.  And  hunger 
weakens  the  strength  in  a  very  marked 
way  and  makes  you  Hable  to  be  run  over, 
or  anything.  Besides  that,  to  be  hungry 
is  not  only  very  uncomfortable  in  itself; 
but  it  makes  you  a  great  nuisance  to  other 
people;  and  the  hungry  person  ought  not 
to  go  into  crowds  for  fear  of  the  con- 
sequences. A  time  was  coming  when  I 
was  going  to  see  hundreds  of  hungry  per- 
sons all  assembled  in  one  place  together; 
but  that  remarkable  and  fearful  sight  did 
not  happen  until  many  months  later. 

The  immediate  result  of  the  fainting  was 
a  change  of  diet,  and  you  will  be  glad  to 
know  I  shall  never  mention  the  bun  and 
the  glass  of  milk  again ;  because  it  went  out 
of  my  career  from  that  day  forward. 

I  had  no  secrets  from  Mr.  Blades,  who 
was  now  my  greatest  and  most  trusted 
friend  in  London.  Therefore  I  told  liim 
about   the   catastrophe,    making   him   first 


96  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

swear  silence;  and  he  explained  it  all  and 
let  nie  go  out  to  lunch  with  him  that  very 
day,  to  show  me  what  a  good  and  nourish- 
ing lunch  ought  to  be. 

"  It  is  silly  to  say  you  can't  pay  for  it," 
declared  JNlr.  Blades,  *'  because  you  must. 
And  it  is  far  better  to  pay  for  a  chop  or 
steak  or  even  a  sausage  and  mashed  and 
half  of  bitter  ale,  than  to  find  yourself 
in  the  doctor's  hands." 

He  was  full  of  these  wise  and  shrewd 
sayings;  so  I  went  to  an  eating-house  with 
him  and  never  laughed  so  much  before, 
owing  to  the  screamingly  funny  way  in 
which  a  waiter  shouted  things  down  a  tube. 
It  was  not  so  much  the  things  in  themselves 
as  the  way  he  shortened  the  names  of  them, 
to  save  his  precious  time.  ]Men  came  in 
and  gave  their  orders,  and  then  this  ridic- 
ulous but  exceedingly  clever  waiter  shouted 
his  version  of  the  orders  down  a  pipe  which 
led  to  the  kitchen  of  the  restaurant,  where 
the  dishes  were  being  prepared. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  97 

It  was  like  this:  the  waiter  cruised  round 
among  the  customers  and  collected  orders 
for  soup.  Two  men  ordered  ox-tail  soup, 
three  had  mock-turtle  soup,  Mr.  Blades  de- 
cided for  vegetable  soup  and  I  had  pea- 
soup.  Well,  of  course,  that  was  far  too 
much  to  shout  down  the  tube,  so  the  genius 
of  a  waiter  said,  "  Two  ox,  three  mocks,  a 
veg,  and  a  pea!"  And  there  you  were! 
In  less  than  no  time  the  various  soups  ap- 
peared, and  the  funniest  thing  of  all  to  me 
was,  that  nobody  saw  anything  funny  about 
it.  But  I  roared  —  I  could  n't  help  it,  and 
much  to  my  regret  annoyed  Mr.  Blades, 
who  told  me  not  to  play  the  fool  where  he 
was  known.  After  a  time  I  steadied  down 
and  made  an  ample  meal;  and  afterwards 
it  transpired  that  it  was  generally  the  cus- 
tom of  Mr.  Blades  to  play  a  couple  of 
games  of  dominoes  with  some  of  his  friends, 
who  lunched  at  the  same  place.  But, 
though  he  promised  to  teach  me,  it  was 
impossible   that    day   owing   to   my   being 


98  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

quite  unsteadied  and  helpless  and  imbecile 
with  laughing  just  at  the  end  of  the  lunch. 

It  was,  I  need  hardly  say,  the  amazing 
waiter.  He  saw  that  he  had  frightfully 
amused  me  and  perhaps  thought  he  would 
get  an  extra  tip  for  being  so  wonderful. 
Which  he  did  do,  for  I  gave  him  sixpence 
and  made  Mr.  Blades  angry  again. 

But  the  waiter  deserved  a  pound,  for 
when  two  men  ordered  Gorgonzola  cheese 
and  another  man  ordered  a  currant  dump- 
ling and  three  others  wanted  kidneys  on 
toast,  he  excelled  himself  by  screaming 
down  to  the  kitchen  these  memorable  words : 

"  Two  Gorgons,  a  dump,  and  three 
kids! "  Then  he  winked  at  me  and  I  sim- 
ply rolled  about  helplessly  and  wept  with 
laughing.  This  must  have  been  one  of 
that  glorious  waiter's  greatest  efforts,  I 
think,  because  several  other  quite  elderly 
men  laughed  too. 

He  was  called  "  ^Villiam,"  and  I  knew 
him  well  in  a  week.    He  had  a  rich  fund  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  99 

humour,  but  was  very  honest  and  hard- 
working and  a  Londoner  to  the  backbone. 
He  hated  foreign  waiters  and  said  that  the 
glitter  of  his  shiny  hair  was  produced  by  a 
little  fat  from  the  grill  well  rubbed  in 
every  morning.  No  barber's  stuff  could 
touch  it,  he  said,  and  if  it  made  him  smell 
like  a  mutton  chop,  who  thought  the  worse 
of  him  for  that?  He  expected  twopence 
after  each  luncheon,  and  if  any  stranger 
gave  him  less,  he  made  screamingly  funny 
remarks.  In  his  evenings  he  waited  at  the 
banquets  of  the  City  Companies,  which  are 
the  most  stupendous  feeds  the  world  has 
ever  known  since  Nero's  times;  and  at 
these  dinners  he  often  heard  State  and 
other  secrets,  which  he  said  would  have 
been  worth  a  Jew's  eye  to  him  if  he  had 
not  been  an  honest  man.  He  did  n't,  of 
course,  say  these  things  as  if  they  were 
meant  to  be  true.  Simple  people  no  doubt 
would  have  believed  them,  but  I  soon  got 
to  notice  that  he  accompanied  many  of  his 


100  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

most  remarkable  statements  with  a  wink, 
which  disarmed  criticism,  as  the  saying  is. 
He  was  a  good  man  at  heart  and  had  a 
Avife  at  home  and  also  a  lame  daughter 
who  would  never  walk;  so,  though  one 
would  not  have  thought  it,  he  had  his  trials. 
In  fact  nearly  everybody  I  met,  when  I 
got  to  know  them,  told  me  about  distress- 
ing things  which  they  hid  from  the  world. 
Even  Mr.  Blades,  who  seemed  to  preserve 
the  even  tenor  of  his  way  with  great  skill, 
confessed  to  me  that  he  had  a  brother  very 
different  from  himself  and  evidently  very 
inferior  in  every  way.  In  fact  it  looked 
to  me,  though  of  course  I  never  hinted  at 
such  a  thing,  that  the  brother  of  Mr. 
Blades  must  have  been  rapidly  sinking 
into  a  shady  customer  of  the  deadliest  sort. 
Really  for  the  moment,  after  I  took  to 
proper  lunches,  it  seemed  as  if  I  was  the 
only  man  in  the  office  with  no  private 
worries. 


VI 


I  FOUND  that  the  clerks  at  the  Apollo 
Fire  Office  were  much  more  interesting 
than  the  work,  and  I  told  Mr.  Blades 
so  on  an  occasion  when  with  his  usual  great 
generosity  he  had  given  me  some  useful 
help,  because  I  was  behind-hand  and  had 
forgotten  what  I  ought  to  have  remem- 
bered. But  that  I  should  find  the  clerks 
more  interesting  than  the  work  did  not 
please  Mr.  Blades,  and  he  thought  badly 
of  the  idea. 

"  If  you  are  going  to  be  an  insurance 
clerk,  the  first  thing  is  to  master  the  in- 
surance business,"  he  said,  very  truly  and 
wisely  to  me;  and  then  it  was  that  I  told 
him  of  my  great  ambition  to  become  an 
actor  in  the  future.  He  instantly  disap- 
proved of  it. 

"  There  was  a  clerk  in  this  office  in  the 


102  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

past,  and  he  went  on  the  stage  and  did 
well,"  he  admitted ;  "  but  he  was  excep- 
tional in  every  way.  He  was  older  than 
you  and  had  a  very  remarkably  handsome 
face." 

"  In  tragedy,"  I  said,  "  a  handsome  face 
does  n't  matter  so  much." 

"  When  you  talk  of  tragedy,"  answered 
Mr.  Blades,  "  you  mention  the  greatest 
heights  of  the  profession.  You  are  not 
built  to  play  tragic  parts,  being  far  too 
thin  and  long  in  the  legs,  in  my  opinion. 
Besides,  it  is  a  calling  in  which  only  one  in 
a  thousand  does  any  real  good.  I  should 
advise  you  to  stick  to  insurance  and  try  to 
master  the  principles  of  it." 

Of  course  I  was  getting  on,  but  the  lower 
walks  of  the  science  of  insurance  are  tame, 
and  it  would  not  be  interesting  to  explain 
rates  and  risks  and  tariffs  and  the  explo- 
sive point  of  mineral  oils  and  other  im- 
portant things,  all  of  which  have  to  be 
taken  into  account  by  the  beginner. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  103 

But  the  clerks  were  far  more  full  of 
interest,  and  some  were  stern  and  ambitious 
men,  who  were  determined  sooner  or  later 
to  get  to  the  top  of  the  office  and  become 
Secretary;  and  some  were  easy  men  with- 
out great  ambition,  but  full  of  ideas,  though 
the  ideas  were  not  about  the  science  of  risk 
from  fire.  There  was  one  remarkable  man, 
whose  age  was  thirty-two,  and  he  lived  at 
Clapham  in  lodgings  all  alone.  This  man, 
whose  name  was  Tomlinson,  possessed 
enormous  ability  in  the  direction  of  race- 
horses. His  knowledge  of  these  famous 
quadrupeds  was  most  extraordinary.  If 
you  looked  into  a  paper  and  saw  the  name 
of  a  racehorse,  Tomlinson  would  instantly 
tell  you  whether  it  was  a  male  or  female 
horse,  and  the  name  of  its  father  and 
mother,  or  I  should  say  sire  and  dam. 
He  would  also  tell  you  its  age  and  its 
owner  and  its  trainer  and  the  jockeys  who 
had  ridden  it,  and  the  races  it  had  run 
and  was  going  to  run,  and  the  money,  if 


104  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

any,  it  had  earned  in  stakes  during  its 
career. 

In  this  singular  man's  desk  were  evi- 
dences of  his  passion  for  the  turf.  Nailed 
to  the  lid  was  the  shoe  or  "  racing  plate  " 
of  a  Derby  winner,  and  arranged  round  it 
were  photographic  portraits  of  racehorses 
extracted  from  packets  of  cigarettes.  A 
particular  brand  of  cigarettes  always  con- 
tained these  portraits,  and  so,  naturally, 
Tomlinson  smoked  them.  He  seldom  went 
to  race-meetings  himself,  but  read  all  the 
particulars  of  each  race  with  great  per- 
severance, in  order  to  guide  his  future  bet- 
ting transactions.  He  had  a  Turf  Agent 
and  visited  him  frequently  during  the 
luncheon  hour,  and  on  the  occasion  of  the 
classic  races,  such  as  the  Derby  and  Oaks, 
or  St.  Leger,  Tomlinson  always  arranged 
a  sweepstake  in  the  Country  Dei)artment 
of  the  Apollo  Fire  Office  and  was  well 
thought  of  for  doing  so. 

He  said  that  if  he  had  been  blessed  with 


OF  SEVENTEEN  105 

a  good  income  he  should  have  become  a 
"  gentleman  backer,"  which  is  some  j)ar- 
ticular  order  of  turf-specialist;  and  if  he 
had  been  born  with  real  wealth,  he  should 
have  been  an  owner  of  racehorses,  and  a 
member  of  the  Jockey  Club.  As  it  was, 
he  knew  several  jockeys  —  though,  cu- 
riouslj^  enough,  jockeys  are  not  themselves 
members  of  this  far-famed  club. 

Then  I  might  mention  Wardle,  who  was 
the  chief  of  one  of  the  divisions  of  the 
Country  Department,  and  a  man  of  such 
varied  mind  that,  while  very  skillful  in  his 
profession  of  insurance,  he  yet  found  lei- 
sure to  develop  the  art  of  music  to  the  very 
highest  pitch.  He  was,  in  fact,  a  pro- 
fessional organist  on  Sundays;  and  not 
contented  with  this,  actually  composed 
music  in  the  loftiest  Gregorian  manner, 
and  played  it  on  his  organ  before  the  con- 
gregation. His  way  of  work  was  a  great 
revelation  to  me,  for  while  Tomlinson 
might   be   calculating  the   proper   weights 


106  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

for  a  handicap,  or  taking  down  names  for 
a  sweepstake,  Wardle,  with  a  piece  of 
music  paper  before  him,  which  it  always 
was  in  his  spare  moments,  would  be  ar- 
ranging triumphs  of  thorough  bass  and 
counterpoint  and  so  on  —  all  to  delight  his 
congregation  some  day,  when  the  composi- 
tion was  finished.  He  did  not  like  Wag- 
ner, and  told  me  that  he  was  a  charlatan 
and  would  soon  vanish  forever;  but  Mo- 
zart he  considered  his  own  master,  and  said 
that  INIozart  was  the  very  spirit  and  essence 
and  soul  of  religious  music.  He  spoke 
bitterly,  but  quite  patiently,  about  the  vicar 
of  the  church  where  he  played  and  said  that 
the  man,  though  a  well-meaning  and  hon- 
ourable man,  had  never  grasped  the  powers 
of  music  in  religion. 

"If  he  had,"  said  Wardle,  "I  should 
have  had  a  new  organ  to  play  upon  long 
ago.  Our  instrument  is  very  inferior  and 
our  choir  a  thing  of  nought.  As  it  is,  the 
peoj^le  come  to  hear  me  and  not  him." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  107 

But  one  of  his  pieces  of  music  had  been 
played  by  a  friend  on  the  organ  of  St. 
Paul's  Cathedral,  and  Wardle  had  heard 
it  and  been  a  good  deal  moved  to  find  how 
his  composition  came  out  amid  the  solemn 
and  glorious  architecture  of  that  sacred 
edifice.  He  hoped  it  would  be  played  at 
Westminster  Abbey,  when  the  regular  or- 
ganist was  taking  his  holiday  and  his  locum 
tenens,  as  they  call  it,  was  in  his  place. 
Because  this  locum  tenens  was  known  to 
Mr.  Wardle  and  believed  in  his  powers  of 
composition. 

This  genuine  musician,  on  finding  that 
every  sort  of  art  interested  me  a  good  deal, 
became  very  friendly  and  was  so  good  as  to 
ask  me  to  go  to  his  church  one  Sunday  and 
hear  him  play,  and  have  dinner  with  him 
afterwards.  It  was  a  great  compliment, 
and  of  course  I  went  and  was  deeply  im- 
pressed to  see  the  amazing  ease  with  which 
Wardle,  in  surplice  and  cassock,  handled 
his   organ    and   managed   the    pedals   and 


108         FROM  THE  ANGLE 

pulled  out  stops,  and  turned  over  the  music 
and  played  psalms  and  hymns  and  re- 
sponses and  so  on,  —  all  with  unfailing 
success.  During  the  collection  the  hymn 
came  to  an  end  too  soon,  and  doubtless, 
with  a  less  complete  master  of  harmony 
than  Wardle,  an  awkward  pause  would 
have  ensued;  but,  with  a  nerve  begot  of 
long  practice,  he  permitted  his  fingers  to 
stray  over  the  "  Ivories,"  as  they  call  them, 
and  his  feet  to  stray  over  the  pedals,  with 
a  result  both  rich  and  harmonious.  A 
solemn  melody  reverberated  through  the 
aisles  and  rolled  from  the  instrument,  and 
entirely  concealed  the  mean  sound  of  pen- 
nies and  threepenny  pieces  falling  into  the 
collecting  dishes. 

I  praised  this  feat  warmly  after  the  serv- 
ice and  Wardle  was  gratified  that  I  had 
noticed  it.  Then  I  asked  him  why  he  did 
not  commit  such  an  improvisation  to  paper, 
so  that  it  should  not  be  lost,  and  he  laughed 
and  said: 


OF  SEVENTEEN  109 

"  Why,  it  was  a  music-hall  tune :  '  Fa- 
ther's teeth  are  stopped  with  zinc! ' " 

He  explained,  to  my  great  astonish- 
ment, that  if  you  alter  the  time  and  the 
general  hang  of  a  tune,  and  play  it  with 
all  the  solemn  notes  and  deep  stops  and 
flourishes  of  an  organ,  the  most  skillful 
ear  is  deceived.  It  was  only  another  trib- 
ute to  the  man's  amazing  cleverness;  but 
somehow  I  felt  disappointed  that  he  should 
have  done  this  thing.  It  seemed  unworthy 
of  him.  He  had  a  piano  of  his  own,  se- 
cured on  the  hire  system;  and  upon  this 
instrument,  after  dinner,  he  played  me  a 
great  deal  of  his  own  music,  including 
many  of  the  numbers  from  a  beautiful 
fairy  opera  that  he  had  written  with  a 
friend  —  the  words  being  by  the  friend. 

"  The  libretto  is  footle,"  confessed  War- 
die;  "but  if  I  could  only  get  a  libretto 
worth  talking  about,  I  should  surprise 
some  of  us." 

I  told  him  that  he  had  already  surprised 


no  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

me;  but,  of  course,  he  meant  the  outer 
world  of  opera-goers  and  enthusiasts  of 
music,  who  abound  in  London,  and  are  to 
be  seen  thronging  the  great  concert  halls 
by  night. 

Another  man  of  exceptional  genius  was 
Bassett  —  a  volunteer  and  a  crack  shot. 
He  belonged  to  the  Artists'  Corps  and  was, 
you  might  say,  every  inch  a  soldier,  in  the 
complete  disguise  of  an  insurance  clerk. 

This  martial  man  seemed  always  to  be 
panting  for  bloodshed,  and  openly  hoped 
that  England  would  go  to  war  with  some 
important  nation  —  in  fact,  one  of  the 
Great  Powers  for  choice  —  before  he  was 
too  old  to  participate  in  the  struggle.  He 
knew  as  much  of  our  military  heroes  as 
Tomlinson  knew  of  our  racehorses.  He 
was  not  content  with  being  a  sergeant  in 
the  Artists'  Corps  and  one  of  their  leading 
marksmen,  but  also  went  into  the  deepest 
science  of  battle  and  tactics  and  strategy. 
He  read  war  by  day  and  he  dreamed  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  111 

war  by  night,  and  he  would  have  liked  to 
see  conscription  come  in  at  any  moment. 

This  fiery,  but  large-hearted  man  was 
very  anxious  for  me  to  become  a  volunteer, 
and  it  was  a  great  sorrow  to  me  to  find 
that  he  did  not  feel  any  further  interest  in 
me  when  I  refused  to  do  so,  while  thank- 
ing him  heartily  for  the  idea.  He  said 
that  drilling  was  far  better  and  more  use- 
ful than  going  down  to  the  L.A.C.  to 
caper  about  half -naked,  and  that  if  I  did 
regular  drills  and  so  on,  I  should  in  time 
come  to  the  Field  Days,  and  have  all  the 
joy  of  forced  marches  and  maneuvers  at 
Easter,  and  sleeping  under  canvas,  and 
going  on  sentry  duty  by  night  and  waking 
to  the  ringing  sound  of  the  trumpet  at 
dawn. 

But  none  of  these  things  tempted  me  as 
much  as  Bassett  expected.  In  fact,  I  had 
already  discovered  in  earlier  life  that  the 
god  Mars  was  nothing  to  me.  Bassett  said 
that  he  did  n't  know  what  the  young  gen- 


112  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

eration  was  coming  to  when  I  told  him  this, 
and  he  hinted,  rather  openly,  that  I  was 
unpatriotic.  Bui  I  would  not  allow  that 
I  was.     I  said: 

"  We  can't  all  be  volunteers,  any  more 
than  we  can  all  be  proper  soldiers." 

And  Dicky  Travers,  who,  though  also 
quite  dead  to  the  martial  spirit,  was  a  most 
patriotic  man  in  sporting  matters,  called 
Bassett  a  "  dog-shooter  "! 

This,  however,  was  merely  repartee,  of 
which  INIr.  Travers  was  a  complete  master. 
In  fact,  he  had  invented  a  nickname  for 
everybody  in  the  Department,  and  at  his 
wish,  having  a  slight  turn  for  rhyming,  I 
made  up  a  long  poem  of  thirty-eight  verses, 
being  one  verse  for  each  man  in  the  De- 
partment. The  mere  poetry,  which  was 
nothing,  was  mine;  but  the  rich  humour 
and  subtle  irony,  not  to  say  satire,  was  the 
work  of  Dicky  Travers.  Each  verse  of 
this  poem  was  arranged  in  the  shape  of  a 
*'  Limerick,"    which    is    a    simple    sort    of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  113 

rhyme  well  suited  to  humour  combined  with 
satire;  and  it  showed  the  delicate  skill  of 
Mr.  Travers  and  his  surprising  knowledge 
of  human  nature,  that  each  person  who 
read  the  poem  invariably  laughed  very 
heartily  at  thirty-seven  verses  —  in  fact,  all 
except  the  verse  about  himself.  I  noticed 
this  peculiar  fact  and  was  rather  aston- 
ished at  it;  but  Travers  was  not  astonished. 
He  said: 

"  My  dear  Corkey,  when  you  are  as  old 
as  I  am,  you  will  find  that  to  see  your 
friends  scored  off  is  one  of  those  trials  in 
life  which  you  can  always  manage  to  get 
over.  But  the  feeling  is  entirely  different 
when  anybody  scores  off  you." 

I  may  give  a  glimpse  of  yet  another 
first-class  and  original  man  before  con- 
cluding this  short  chapter  and  proceeding 
to  more  serious  business. 

In  some  ways  Mr.  Bent,  who  lived  at 
Chislehurst,  was  among  the  most  naturally 
gifted  of  the  staff  of  the  Country  Depart- 


lU  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

ment  of  the  Apollo.  His  talent,  or  you 
might  almost  say  "  genius,"  was  purely 
horticultural;  and  by  dint  of  long  and 
patient  study,  and  devoting  his  entire 
spare  income  and  all  his  spare  time  to  the 
subject,  he  had  gradually  arranged  and 
planted  a  garden  that  would  undoubtedly 
have  become  historical,  if  only  it  had  been 
a  little  bit  larger. 

It  was  his  custom  to  give  the  Depart- 
ment a  taste  of  his  great  skill  during  the 
summer  months,  for  flowers  were  to  him 
what  a  sporting  paper  was  to  Tomlinson, 
or  a  rifle  to  Bassett  —  in  fact,  the  breath 
of  his  nostrils. 

On  his  desk  he  had  two  vases,  and  in 
these  vases  always  stood  choice  blossoms 
during  official  hours.  Sometimes  I  recog- 
nised them,  and  oftener  I  did  not;  but 
when  I  did  not,  Mr.  Bent,  who  was  a  man 
of  mild  expression  and  thin  and  stooping 
appearance,  told  me  the  names,  such  as 
Alstromeria    and    Carpentaria    and    Ber- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  115 

beridopsis  and  Oncocyclus  Iris  and  Par- 
danthes  and  Calochortus  and  Magnolia 
and  Mummy  Pea  and  many  another  horti- 
cultural triumph  of  the  rarest  sort.  After 
the  day  was  done,  with  the  generosity  of 
the  born  gardener,  he  would  give  away 
these  precious  things  to  anybody  who 
wanted  a  buttonhole;  but  there  were  times 
when  he  naturally  expected  some  return 
for  magnificent  hothouse  exotics,  which  he 
brought  to  the  office  in  the  depths  of  win- 
ter or  early  spring,  when  flowers  were 
worth  money.  Such  things  as  gardenias 
and  Marechal  Niel  roses  and  Eucharis 
lilies  he  invariably  raffled  —  not,  as  he  told 
me,  for  gain,  but  simply  to  pay,  or  help 
pay,  for  the  expense  of  buying  coke  for 
his  hothouse,  the  temperature  of  which  had 
to  be  kept  up  to  fever  heat,  as  you  might 
say,  in  order  that  the  various  tropical 
marvels  grown  by  Mr.  Bent  should  sur- 
vive the  English  winter. 

Finding  that  I  was  very  anxious  to  un- 


116  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

derstand  gardening,  because  I  knew  that 
many  famous  actors  had  said  in  news- 
papers that  they  occupied  their  leisure  in 
their  palatial  gardens  and  orchid  houses, 
Mr.  Bent  most  kindly  allowed  me  to  go 
down  one  afternoon  after  office  hours,  not 
only  to  see  his  garden,  but,  better  still,  to 
watch  him  gardening  in  it. 

"  It  is  a  pursuit  that  needs  certain  gifts," 
he  told  me,  as  we  rode  in  the  train  to 
Chislehurst.  "  You  must,  of  course,  first 
have  the  enthusiasm  and  love  of  the  science 
for  itself  but  that  is  not  enough.  You 
must  make  sacrifices  and  read  learned 
books  and  study  the  life-history  of  plants 
and  their  various  requirements.  Some,  for 
instance,  like  lime  and  some  die  if  you  give 
them  lime.  A  lily,  or  a  rhodo.  or  an  azalea 
hates  lime;  a  rose  likes  it.  Some  alpine 
plants  must  have  limestone  chips  to  be 
prosperous;  others,  again,  like  granite 
chips.  My  son,  a  child  of  tender  age  but 
already  full  of  the  gardening  instinct,  once 


OF  SEVENTEEN  117 

gave  a  choice  saxifrage  a  pennyworth  of 
cocoaniit  chips  —  under  the  infantile  hope 
that  what  pleased  him  so  well  would  please 
the  plant.  A  touching  story  which  does 
not  in  my  opinion  spoil  by  repetition." 

In  this  improving  way  Mr.  Bent  talked, 
and  when  we  reached  his  home  he  disap- 
peared instantly  to  don  his  gardening 
clothes,  while  his  wife  gave  me  some  tea. 
She,  too,  was  a  gardener  and  very  kindly 
advised  me  to  be  especially  delighted  with 
a  plant  called  Mysotidium,  which  Mr. 
Bent  had  flowered  for  the  first  time  in  his 
life.  It  was  rather  like  a  huge  forget-me- 
not  with  rhubarb  leaves,  and  it  came  from 
New  Zealand  and  cost  five  shillings. 

Then  Mrs.  Bent's  little  boy  arrived  and 
she  told  me  how  he  had  given  cocoanut 
chips  to  the  saxifrage ;  and  he  did  n't  like 
me,  unfortunately,  and  would  n't  go  into 
the  garden  with  me.  And  then  Mr.  Bent 
returned  accoutred  in  all  the  trappings  of 
the    professional    gardener.      He    wore    a 


118  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

blue  apron  and  leather  gloves  and  a  clump 
of  bast  sticking  out  of  his  pocket;  and  his 
trousers  and  sleeves  turned  up  and  every- 
thing complete. 

"  I  must  be  busy,"  he  said,  "  but  my 
collection  is  completely  labeled,  and  you 
will  have  no  difficulty  in  following  the  gen- 
eral scheme  of  the  garden." 

This  was  true,  because  of  the  great  sim- 
plicity of  the  scheme.  The  garden,  in  fact, 
ran  down  quite  straight  between  two  other 
gardens,  and  finished  at  a  brick  wall. 

"  A  howling  wilderness  you  see  on  each 
side,"  explained  Mr.  Bent,  waving  his 
trowel  to  the  right  and  left.  By  this  he 
meant,  of  course,  that  the  other  gardens 
only  had  roses  and  wallflowers  and  carna- 
tions and  larkspurs  and  lilac,  and  the  com- 
mon or  garden  flowers  familiar  to  the  com- 
mon or  garden  gardener.  But  it  was  no 
"  side  "  on  Mr.  Bent's  part  to  talk  in  this 
scornful  way,  because  to  him,  from  his 
eagle  heights  of  horticulture,  so  to  speak. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  119 

his  neighbours'  gardens  were  barren  wastes, 
with  nothing  in  them  to  detain  the  expert 
for  a  moment. 

His  garden  was  literally  stuffed  with 
rare  and  curious  things.  He  admitted  that 
some  of  them  were  not  beautiful;  but  they 
were  rare  and  in  some  cases  he  doubted  if 
anybody  else  in  Kent  had  them.  It  never 
occurred  to  him  that  nobody  else  in  Kent 
might  want  them.  Everything  was  beau- 
tifull}^  labelled  with  metal  labels,  and  many 
of  the  rarer  and  more  precious  alpine 
plants  had  zinc  guards  put  round  them  to 
keep  away  garden  pests,  such  as  slugs  and 
snails. 

I  could  n't  believe  that  a  snail  would 
have  dared  to  show  his  face  in  that  garden; 
but  Mr.  Bent  said  he  always  had  to  be 
fighting  them,  and  that  sometimes  they 
conquered  and  managed  to  scale  a  zinc 
guard  and  devour  a  small  choice  alpine  in 
a  single  night! 

He  had  most  beautiful  flowers  to  show 


120  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

nie;  or  rather  he  let  me  walk  up  and  down 
among  them  while  he  gardened.  It  was 
very  interesting  to  see  the  sure  professional 
touch  of  Mr.  Bent.  He  never  hesitated  or 
doubted  what  to  do.  He  knew  exactly 
what  to  cut  off  a  plant,  or  how  much  water 
to  give  it,  or  how  to  tie  up  a  trailer.  He 
planted  out  a  few  seedling  zinnias  to  show 
me.  Then  he  watered  them  in  and  re- 
moved the  seed  boxes,  and  all  was  neat  and 
tidy  in  a  moment. 

He  handled  long  and  difficult  Latin 
names  with  the  consummate  ease  of  a  na- 
tive, and  he  showed  me  piles  of  gardeners' 
catalogues.  Once  he  had  raised  a  begonia 
from  seed,  which  they  accepted  at  Kew 
Gardens,  and  the  Director  of  Kew  gave 
him  something  in  exchange  for  his  hot- 
house. 

"It  died,"  said  Mr.  Bent,  "and  that 
through  no  fault  of  mine;  but  the  distinc- 
tion and  the  compliment  have  not  died  and 
never  will." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  121 

He  was  a  member  of  the  R.H.S.,  or 
Royal  Horticultural  Society,  and  he  had 
shown  a  plant  now  and  again  at  their 
meetings,  but  without  any  honour  falling 
to  it. 

Before  supper  I  was  allowed  to  help 
Mr.  Bent  with  a  garden  hose  on  the  grass; 
and  while  we  were  at  work  a  man  from 
next-door  looked  over  the  wall  and  wished 
Mr.  Bent  "  good-evening "  and  asked  for 
some  advice.  Seeing  me,  he  told  me  the 
story  of  Mr.  Bent's  little  boy  and  the 
cocoanut  chips  for  the  third  time;  then  he 
explained  to  Mr.  Bent  that  his  sweet  peas 
were  curling  up  rather  oddly  and  said  that 
he  would  thank  him  to  go  and  have  a  look 
at  them. 

"Good  Lord,  the  peas  a  failure!"  said 
Mr.  Bent;  then  with  his  usual  kindness  he 
instantl}^  hastened  to  see  if  anything  could 
be  done.  When  he  returned  I  could  see 
that  he  was  troubled. 

"  His  peas  have  failed,"  he  said.     "  It 


122  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

is  one  of  those  disasters  that  come  upon 
even  good  gardeners  sometimes.  Not  that 
Mason  is  a  good  gardener,  or,  in  fact,  a 
gardener  at  all  in  the  real  sense.  I  don't 
know  what  has  happened  to  his  peas  —  the 
trouble  is  below  ground  and  might  be  one 
of  five  different  things;  but  all  is  over  with 
the  peas.  I  have  told  him  to  give  up  hope 
about  them.  I  may  be  able  to  spare  him 
some  annuals  later." 

Mrs.  Bent,  who  was  a  most  perfect 
woman  for  a  gardener's  wife,  insisted  on 
picking  me  a  bunch  of  good  and  sweet 
flowers  before  I  went  away,  and  then,  just 
as  I  was  going,  Mr.  Bent's  brother-in-law 
walked  past  the  gate  and  stopped  to  ask 
a  horticultural  question.  He  was  a  be- 
ginner, but  such  was  Mr.  Bent's  fire  and 
genius  in  these  matters  that  he  inspired 
everybody  with  his  own  passion  for  the 
science  and,  as  he  truly  said,  no  one  could 
know  him  intimately  without  sooner  or 
later  becoming  a  gardener. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  123 

I  am  sure  I  was  full  of  enthusiastic 
joy  about  it  after  supper,  and  if  my  Aunt 
Augusta  had  had  enough  garden  to  grow 
a  blade  of  grass,  I  should  have  planted 
one.  Even  as  it  was,  I  planned  a  box 
for  bulbs  and  things  during  the  next 
autumn. 

Mr.  Bent's  brother-in-law  happened  to 
be  going  to  the  tobacconist's,  and  he  walked 
as  far  as  the  station  with  me  after  he  had 
bought  half  a  pound  of  coarse  tobacco  to 
fumigate  his  greenhouse,  which  was  burst- 
ing with  green-fly  and  other  pests.  Thus 
I  heard  the  story  of  Mr.  Bent's  little  boy 
and  the  cocoanut  chips  for  the  fourth  time, 
and  it  was  rather  instructive  in  its  way  to 
find  how  the  fun  of  it  had  waned.  In  fact, 
such  was  my  feeling  to  the  story,  that  I 
did  n't  even  tell  it  to  Aunt  Augusta  when 
I  got  home;  though,  coming  fresh  to  her, 
it  might  have  faintly  amused  her. 

As  an  example  of  the  poem  that  I  had 
written  with  Dicky  Travers,   I  may  here 


124    THE  AXGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

quote  the  verse  upon  Mr.   Bent.     It  ran 
as  follows: 

*'  A  middle-aged  wonder  called  Bent, 
Made  the  deuce  of  a  garden  in  Kent, 
And  his  roses  and  lilies 
And  dafFadown  dillies 
All  helped  with  the  gentleman's  rent." 

Here,  you  see,  was  humour  combined 
with  satire.  But  the  peculiarity  of  the 
poem  held  in  the  case  of  this  verse,  as  it 
did  in  all  the  others.  While  everybody 
else  thought  it  good,  Mr.  Bent  considered 
it  vulgar  and  did  n't  like  it  in  the  least, 
because  of  the  ironic  allusion  to  raffles. 

He  never  asked  me  to  see  his  garden 
again,  though  I  entered  for  raffle  after 
raffle  of  his  choice  exotics  and  once  won 
four  fine  gardenias,  at  the  ridiculous  cost 
of  a  penny,  and  took  them  home  to  Aunt 
Augusta. 


VII 

IN  course  of  time  Mr.  Travers  in- 
formed me  that  I  was  elected  an  active 
member  of  the  L.A.C.  These  magic 
letters  stand  for  the  London  Athletic 
Club,  easily  the  most  famous  athletic  club 
in  the  world.  I  had  been  there  as  one  of 
the  public  on  several  occasions,  and  already 
knew  by  sight  such  giants  of  the  arena  as 
Phillips  and  George  and  Cowie  and  other 
most  notable  men,  all  historically  famous. 
In  fact  George  soon  joined  the  profes- 
sional ranks,  as  we  say,  and  the  day  was 
coming  when  he  would  run  a  mile  faster 
than  anybody  in  the  world  had  ever  run  it. 

The  first  time  I  went  to  Stamford 
Bridge  it  so  happened  that  a  most  sad 
misfortune  fell  on  my  friend  Dicky  Travers. 

He  had  entered  for  a  two-mile  walking 
race  and  trained  very  carefully  for  it  —  as 


126  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

well  he  might,  because,  such  was  his  uni- 
versal fame  at  this  distance,  that  he  was 
handicapped  to  give  all  the  other  com- 
petitors a  lot  of  start.  Some  had  actually 
as  much  as  a  minute  start;  but  Dicky 
started  from  scratch.  He  told  me  in  the 
morning  of  the  day  that  he  felt  verj'^  well 
and  expected  to  get  pretty  near  fourteen 
minutes  for  the  two  miles.  I  lunched  with 
him  on  the  day,  and,  as  it  was  an  evening 
meeting  at  the  L.A.C.  and  he  would  not 
be  racing  before  six  o'clock,  he  ate  a  steak 
and  some  bread  and  cheese;  but  he  drank 
nothing  but  water;  because  experience  had 
shown  him  that  beer  was  no  use  before  a 
great  struggle  of  this  sort. 

In  due  time,  after  the  first  heats  of  a 
"  sprint  "  and  a  half-mile  race,  the  walking 
competition  came  on,  and  I  was  very  glad 
to  hear  several  spectators  cheer  Travers 
when  he  appeared  on  the  cinder  path.  I 
also  did  the  same.  He  wore  black  drawers 
and   vest;   but   the   rest   of   him    was,    of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  127 

course,  entirely  bare,  save  for  his  feet, 
which  were  encased  in  walking  shoes  which 
he  had  made  expressly  to  his  directions. 
In  each  hand  he  carried  an  oblong  cork, 
and  his  face  had  a  cheerful  and  calm  ex- 
pression which  little  indicated  the  great 
ordeal  before  him. 

Eight  men  had  entered  for  the  race,  and 
the  limit  man  went  off  at  such  a  great  pace 
that  it  seemed  absurd  to  suppose  Travers 
coidd  ever  get  near  him.  Others  started 
quickly  after  each  other  according  to  the 
handicap,  and  then  a  man  called  Forrester 
started.  He  was  next  to  Travers  and  re- 
ceived only  ten  seconds  start  from  him. 
But  such  was  his  speed  that  he  had  gone 
about  forty  yards  before  Dicky  was  told 
to  go. 

Every  eye  was  fixed  upon  the  scratch 
man  as,  with  a  magnificent  and  raking 
action,  he  set  out  on  his  gigantic  task. 
Though  not  very  tall,  he  had  a  remarkable 
stride,   and  his   legs,   which   were   slightly 


128  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

hairy  and  magnificently  shaped,  were  re- 
markable, owing  to  a  muscle  that  had  de- 
veloped on  the  front  of  the  shin  bones. 
This  is  the  walking  muscle,  and  only  great 
walkers  and  racers  have  it  developed  in  this 
extraordinary  manner.  Travers  had  a  very 
long  stride  and  a  graceful  motion.  You 
didn't  realise  that  he  was  going  so  fear- 
fully fast  till  you  saw  that,  from  the  first, 
he  began  to  gain  uf)on  the  rest.  Some  of 
the  others  —  all,  of  course,  men  of  great 
distinction  —  appeared  to  be  walking  quite 
as  fast  as  Dicky;  but  they  were  not.  Um- 
pires ran  along  on  the  grass  inside  the 
track  to  see  the  walking  was  fair;  and  the 
men  who  performed  this  onerous  task  had 
all  been  famous  also  in  their  day. 

At  last  they  exercised  their  umpiring 
powers  and  stopped  one  of  the  competitors. 
He  had  a  most  curious  action,  certainly, 
and  several  experts  near  me  prophesied 
from  the  first  that  he  would  be  pulled  out. 
He  did  n't  seem  to  be  actually  running  and 


OF  SEVENTEEN  129 

he  did  n't  seem  to  be  actually  walking.  It 
was  a  kind  of  shuffle  of  a  very  swift  and 
speedy  character;  but  whatever  it  exactly 
was,  the  umpires  did  n't  like  it  and  told 
him  that  he  was  disqualified.  He  was  a 
very  tall  man  in  a  red  costume,  and  he 
did  n't  seem  in  the  least  surprised  when 
they  stopped  him.  In  fact  he  was  rather 
glad,  I  believe.  A  spectator  next  to  me, 
smoking  a  cigar  and  talking  very  loud, 
said  that  the  man  had  been  really  making 
the  pace  for  another  man. 

Now  the  race  had  covered  a  mile  and 
Travers  was  walking  in  the  most  magnifi- 
cent manner  it  is  possible  to  describe.  An 
expression  of  great  fierceness  was  in  his 
eye  and  he  was  foaming  slightly  at  the 
mouth,  like  a  spirited  steed.  He  and  the 
man  who  had  received  ten  seconds  from 
him  were  too  good  for  the  rest  of  the  field, 
and  when  they  had  covered  a  mile  and  a 
half,  they  passed  the  leader  up  to  that  dis- 
tance and  simply  left  him  standing  still. 


130  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

It  was  now  clear  there  was  going  to  be  a 
historic  race  for  the  victory  between  For- 
rester and  Travers,  and  the  supporters  of 
each  great  athlete  shouted  encouragement 
and  yelled  and  left  no  stone  unturned  to 
excite  their  man  to  make  a  supreme  effort 
and  win.  Travers  and  Forrester  were 
walking  one  behind  the  other  and  it  was, 
of  course,  a  classical  exhibition  of  fair 
*'  heel-and-toe  "  work,  such  as  is  probably 
never  seen  outside  the  famous  precincts  of 
the  L.A.C.  I  shrieked  for  Travers  and  the 
man  next  me,  with  the  cigar,  howled  for 
Forrester.  Such  was  his  excitement  that 
the  man  with  the  cigar  seized  his  hat  and 
waved  it  to  Forrester  as  he  passed;  and 
seeing  him  do  this,  I  seized  my  hat,  too,  and 
waved  it  to  Dicky. 

Of  course  Travers,  with  the  enormous 
cunning  of  the  old  stager,  had  kept  just 
behind  Forrester  all  the  waj^  —  to  let  him 
set  the  pace;  but  now  he  knew  that  For- 
rester was  slacking  off  a  little  —  to  save 


OF  SEVENTEEN  131 

himself  for  a  great  finish  —  and  so  Travers 
felt  that  the  time  had  come  to  make  his 
bid  for  victory.  It  was  just  passing  me 
that  he  did  so,  and  I  saw  the  flash  of 
genius  in  his  eye  as  he  gathered  himself  for 
the  supreme  effort  that  was  to  dash  the 
hopes  of  Forrester.  Only  one  more  round 
of  the  cinder  track  had  to  be  made,  so 
Dicky  instantly  got  to  Forrester's  shoulder 
and,  after  a  few  terrific  moments,  during 
which  I  and  the  man  with  the  cigar  and 
many  others  practically  ceased  to  breathe, 
Travers  wrested  the  lead  from  Forrester. 
It  was  a  gigantic  achievement  and  a  cool 
and  knowing  sportsman  near  me  with  a 
stop  watch  in  his  hand  declared  that  if 
Dicky  was  n't  pulled  up  he  would  do 
fourteen  and  a  quarter.  "  He's  getting 
among  it,"  said  the  cool  hand,  which  was 
his  way  of  meaning  that  Travers  was  prom- 
ised to  achieve  a  notable  performance. 

But  Forrester  was  not  yet  done  with. 
This  magnificent  walker,  in  no  way   dis- 


132  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

couraged  by  his  doughty  foeman,  stuck 
gamely  to  his  colossal  task  and  Travers, 
try  as  he  would,  could  not  shake  him  off. 

"He's  lifting!  He's  lifting!"  screamed 
the  man  with  the  cigar.  "  Pull  him  out — 
stop  him! " 

"He's  not  —  you're  a  liar!"  I  shouted 
back,  in  a  fever  of  rage,  because  the  friend 
of  Forrester,  of  course,  meant  that  Travers 
was  lifting.  And  if  you  "  lift "  in  a  walk- 
ing race,  you  are  running  and  not  walk- 
ing and  all  is  over. 

They  had  only  two  hundred  yards  to  go 
and  Travers  was  still  in  front,  when  an 
umpire,  to  my  horror,  approached  Dickj^ 
He  had  been  watching  Dicky's  legs  with  a 
microscopic  scrutiny  for  some  time  and 
now  he  stopped  the  leader  and  told  him 
that  he  was  disqualified. 

I  shouted  "Shame!  Shame!"  with  all 
my  might,  and  so  did  several  other  men; 
but  the  man  with  the  cigar,  who  evidently 
understood  only  too  well  the  subtleties  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  133 

lifting  among  sprint  walkers,  screamed 
shrilly  with  exaggerated  joy  and  behaved 
like  a  silly  fool  in  every  possible  way. 

Forrester,  relieved  of  his  formidable 
rival,  took  jolly  good  care  not  to  lift  him- 
self. And  as  the  next  man  in  the  race 
was  nearly  a  hundred  yards  behind,  he,  of 
course,  won  comfortably. 

Travers  behaved  like  the  magnificent 
sportsman  he  was,  and  I  felt  just  as  proud 
of  knowing  him  as  if  he  'd  actually  won ; 
for  he  did  not  whine  and  swear  and  bully 
the  umpires  or  anything  like  that.  He 
just  took  his  coat  from  the  bench  where  he 
had  thrown  it  before  the  race,  inquired  of 
the  timekeeper  what  Forrester  had  done  it 
in,  and  presently  walked  into  the  dressing- 
room  with  the  others,  quite  indifferent  to 
the  hearty  cheers  that  greeted  him  and  the 
victor. 

I  went  in  while  he  dressed  and  he  said 
the  verdict,  though  hard,  was  just. 

"  I  knew  he  was  going  to  do  me  when 


134  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

he  came  up  again  after  I  passed  him," 
explained  Travers.  "  He  's  a  North  Lon- 
don chaj)  in  a  lawyer's  office.  I  've  never 
walked  against  him  before.  I  ought  to 
have  pushed  him  much  earlier  and  tried  to 
outwalk  him  for  the  mile.  He  's  got  fine 
pace.  Look  at  the  time  —  14.22  —  and  he 
was  n't  walking  after  I  came  off.  I  meet 
him  again  at  Catford  Bridge  next  month. 
He  seems  a  very  good  sort." 

Thus  did  this  remarkable  sportsman  take 
his  defeat.  But  he  was,  of  course,  cast 
down  by  it,  for  he  had  only  been  stopped 
twice  before  during  the  whole  of  his  hon- 
ourable and  brilliant  career  on  the  cinder 
path. 

As  for  my  own  experience,  I  went  down 
after  my  election  and  Travers  himself 
came  to  see  how  I  shaped.  At  Merivale 
I  had  been  a  sprinter  and  had  done  well 
up  to  two  hundred  yards,  and  since  I  came 
to  London  I  had  seen  Harr}^  Hutchings 
—  the  greatest  sprinter  who  ever  lived  and 


OF  SEVENTEEN  135 

of  course  a  professional  champion.  There- 
fore I  decided  to  go  in  for  that  branch  of 
the  pedestrian's  art.  I  bought  my  costume, 
which  was  entirely  black,  like  Dicky's,  and 
a  pair  of  spiked  running  shoes  and  a  black 
bag  to  carry  them  in.  Then  I  went  down 
one  evening  after  office  hours  with  my 
friend,  and  he  introduced  me  to  Nat  Perry 
and  his  son,  Charles  Perry.  Nat  Perry 
was  the  hero  of  many  a  hard-won  field, 
and  immense  and  dogged  courage  sat  upon 
his  bronzed  and  clean-shaved  countenance. 
Many  hundreds  of  athletes  had  passed 
through  his  hands  to  victory  or  defeat,  as 
the  case  might  be,  and  he  was  a  master 
in  the  art  of  judging  an  athlete's  powers. 
As  the  friend  of  Travers  he  welcomed  me 
with  great  kindness,  heard  that  I  wanted 
to  be  a  sprinter,  but  seemed  doubtful 
whether  I  was  the  sort  of  build  for  that 
branch  of  running. 

"  You   look   more   like   a   half-miler   or 
miler  with  them  legs,"  he  said,  casting  his 


136  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

eye  over  me  critically  but  kindly.  "  And 
you  're  on  the  thin  side.  You  want  to  put 
on  some  flesh.    But  you  're  young  yet." 

I  told  Nat  Perry  that  I  hoped  to  put  on 
some  flesh  and  that  I  was  prepared  to  fol- 
low his  advice  in  everything.  We  came 
out  on  to  the  track  presently,  and  I  ran 
and  Perry  watched.  But  he  kept  very 
calm  about  it  and  I  had  a  sort  of  feeling  he 
was  n't  much  interested.    Presently  he  said : 

"  You  don't  begin  running  till  you  've 
gone  fifty  yards.  Start  running  from  the 
jump  off." 

He  asked  another  man,  who  was  train- 
ing, to  show  me  how  to  start;  because  his 
own  athletic  days  were,  of  course,  at  an 
end,  and  he  could  not  show  me  in  person. 
But  the  other  man  most  kindly  came  over 
and  showed  me  how  to  get  set  and  how  to 
start  like  an  arrow  from  a  bow,  which  is 
half  the  art  of  sprinting. 

After  the  trial  was  over  Nat  Perry  said 
that  it  was   impossible   to   prophesy   any- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  137 

thing  until  I  had  shaken  down  and  found 
my  feet  on  the  cinders.  "  You  may  be  a 
runner  or  you  may  not,"  he  told  me. 
"  I  've  seen  bigger  duffers  than  you  shape 
into  runners.  You  work  hard  for  a  month 
and  get  up  your  appetite  and  eat  all  you 
can  pack  away.  Running  or  no  running, 
the  exercise  in  the  open  air 's  what  you 
want,  and  plenty  of  it." 

He  rubbed  me  down  after  I  had  had  a 
shower  bath  and  gave  me  a  locker  for  my 
things.  He  was  a  good  man  besides  being 
so  famous,  and  everybody  thought  a  great 
deal  of  him  at  the  L.A.C.  His  son  was 
also  an  exceedingly  clever  trainer. 

In  course  of  time  I  was  introduced  to  a 
few  of  the  stars  of  the  club,  with  whom, 
of  course,  Travers  mixed  on  terms  of  per- 
fect equality.  They  were  all  brilliant  men, 
and  their  knowledge  of  athletics  and  times 
and  great  feats  of  the  past  filled  me  with 
interest  and  respect. 

I  enjoyed  the  evenings  at  the  L.A.C. 


l.'iH  rilDM  THE  AXGT.E 

very  mueli  incJcccJ,  arjd  1  grufiually  irn- 
\>n>vt(\  till  l*crry  d(-(!i(JerJ  that  I  had  hettcr 
enter  for  one  of  the  evening  handicaps. 

"  Jt  will  accustom  you  to  the  feel  of  it," 
he  said.  "  Vou  '11  have  to  get  over  the 
strangeness  before  you  do  anything;  and 
there  's  your  handicap  to  he  thought  on. 
As  an  unknowrj  you  won't  have  your  fair 
start  at.  first;  hut  after  you've  lost  your 
heat  for  a  njontli  of  Sundays,  then  you  '11 
he  on  your  proper  mark  and  may  get  on. 
You  're  not  a  flyer  and  very  like  never  will 
he  —  you  ain't  got  the  })hysic;  hut  you  '11  do 
a  hit,  I  dare  say.  Anrl  tliere  's  hope  for  a 
mile,  if  you  come  on  next  year.  No  good 
for  a  quarter  Dor  yet  a  half  —  too  punish- 
ing.    Your  'eart  would  n't  stand  it." 

'I'htjs  this  af)le  ;ifid  honest  man  encour- 
aged me  cautiously  and  I  olx-yed  him,  and 
in  due  time  apfjcared  to  contest  my  heat 
in  a  hunrired  yards'  liandicrap. 

Jt  was  exciting,  }>ut  it  did  n't  hist  long. 
I   took   a   prelirm'nary    sjjin   and    then,    eu- 


I 


OF  SEVENTEEN  139 

riously  enough,  a  thing  happened  that 
quite  put  nie  off  for  the  moment.  You 
must  know  tlie  L.A.C.  ground  ran  along 
one  side  of  a  railway  cutting  and  on  the 
other  side,  running,  in  fact,  parallel  with 
the  athletic  grounds,  was  a  cemetery. 
And  now,  just  as  I  was  going  to  have  a 
second  preliminary  spin,  there  came  across 
the  railway  cuttuig  the  exceedingly  mourn- 
ful sound  of  a  funeral  bell  tolHng.  Some- 
how I  felt  that  while  on  one  side  of  the 
line  was  a  crowd  of  excited  and  eager  men 
full  of  life  and  hope  and  joy,  and  others, 
like  myself,  also  full  of  life  and  hope  and 
joy,  going  to  rim  in  a  competition  and 
exert  their  wonderful  energies  to  the  ut- 
most —  while  this  was  happening  upon  one 
side  of  the  railway  cutting,  a  scene  of  a 
very  ditferent  nature  was  going  on  upon 
the  other.  And  I  got  a  sort  of  fancy  they 
were  burying  a  young  man  in  his  eight- 
eenth year,  like  myself  —  a  man  who  only 
a   few  davs  before  was   full  of  liuht,   and 


140         FROM  THE  ANGLE 

enjoying  life  and  hoping  no  doubt  some 
day  to  be  somebody  worth  talking  about. 
And  now,  instead  of  taking  the  world  by 
storm  and  getting  knighted  even,  or  other 
honours,  here  was  the  unfortunate  chap 
being  tolled  into  the  earth  under  the  weep- 
ing eyes  of  a  heartbroken  mother  and 
other  relations.  The  realitj^  of  the  thing 
was  fearful,  and  it  was  rather  sad  in  a  way, 
too,  because  it  did  me  no  good  to  have  my 
mind  distracted  in  this  manner  just  before 
I  was  called  upon  to  battle  against  four 
other  men,  all  considerably  older  than  I 
was  myself. 

In  fact  they  had  to  rouse  me  and  call 
me  to  the  starting-post,  where  the  other 
competitors  had  already  assembled.  There 
was  no  man  at  scratch  in  my  heat,  but  a 
great  and  jjowerful  athlete  called  ISlus- 
pratt,  who  received  four  yards  from 
scratch,  was  the  best  runner  of  the  five.  I 
got  eight  yards,  which  was  only  four  from 
Muspratt    and    not    enough;    and    of    the 


OF  SEVENTEEN  141 

other  three  men  in  the  race,  one,  who  was 
startlingly  fat  to  be  a  sprinter,  had  nine 
yards  and  one  had  ten. 

At  the  sound  of  the  pistol  we  all  dashed 
off  and  I  started  fairly  well.  The  sensa- 
tion in  a  sprint  of  this  kind  is  most  in- 
teresting, because  at  first  your  position  with 
respect  to  the  other  runners  is  unchanged. 
Though  you  are  all  flying  along  at  a  ter- 
rific pace,  you  appear  to  be  all  hardly 
moving  at  all.  But  then,  after  about  half 
the  distance  had  been  run,  I  found,  much 
to  my  astonishment,  that  I  had  caught  the 
man  who  had  one  yard  start  from  me,  and 
both  he  and  I  were  almost  dead  level  with 
the  front  man.  Now,  of  course,  was  the 
time  for  me  to  make  my  supreme  effort; 
but  just  as  I  was  about  to  do  so,  I  be- 
came conscious  of  something  white  on  my 
left  and  found,  to  my  great  interest,  that 
Muspratt  was  only  a  yard  behind  me.  In 
,fact  he  was  already  making  his  effort,  and 
when  I  made  mine  it  proved  useless  against 


142  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Muspratt,  who  was  an  old  warhorse  of  the 
cinder  path  and  a  magnificent  judge  of 
pace.  Twenty  yards  from  the  tape  I  hon- 
estly believe  the  whole  five  of  us  were  in  a 
dead  line;  but  Muspratt  really  had  us  in 
the  hollow  of  his  hand,  though  we  little 
knew  it  and  all  strained  every  nerve  for 
victory.  He  slid  past  us,  however,  and 
broke  the  tape  a  yard  ahead  of  myself  and 
the  fat  man.  And  I  was  honestly  more 
amazed  by  the  splendid  running  of  the  fat 
man  than  anything  else  in  the  heat;  be- 
cause it  showed  what  pluck  and  training 
and  the  genius  of  Nat  Perry  could  do, 
even  for  such  an  unpromising  sprinter. 

Travers,  who  most  kindly  consented  to 
come  down  that  evening  and  encourage 
me,  though  he  was  not  doing  anything 
himself,  figured  it  all  out  very  correctly 
on  paper  afterwards.  The  heat  was  run 
in  ten  and  three-fifths  of  a  second  by  Mus- 
pratt with  four  yards  start,  and  he  beat 
me    by    a    yard    and    a    half.      Therefore 


OF  SEVENTEEN  143 

Travers  considered  that  I  had  done  what 
would  have  amounted  to  a  shade  worse  than 
eleven  seconds  from  scratch. 

Muspratt,  who  ran  in  an  eyeglass,  by  the 
way,  which  was  interesting  in  itself,  though 
spectacles  were  common  enough  with 
sprinters,  got  second  in  the  final  heat,  which 
was  won  by  a  man  with  nine  yards  start, 
who  had  never  before  won  as  much  as  a 
salt-cellar,  though  he  had  been  competing 
for  two  years  unavailingly. 

But  though  of  great  interest  to  me,  I 
cannot  say  any  more  about  my  doings  at 
the  London  Athletic  Club,  because  other 
more  important  matters  have  to  be  told. 
What  with  running  and  cricket  matches 
against  other  Fire  and  Life  Insurance 
Offices,  I  now  got  plenty  of  exercise  and 
felt  exceedingly  well  and  keen  to  proceed 
with  the  most  important  business  of  my 
life  —  which  was,  of  course,  to  become  a 
tragic  actor  and  play  in  the  greatest  dra- 
matic achievements  of  the  human  mind. 


VIII 

AT  last  there  came  the  solemn  evening 
/\  when  I  arrived  at  the  Dramatic 
School. 

It  was  in  a  quiet  sort  of  corner  off  the 
top  of  Regent  Street,  and  I  got  there  at 
six  o'clock  for  my  first  lesson  in  the  Thes- 
pian art.  No  less  than  four  other  young- 
ish men  had  already  assembled,  and  with 
them  was  an  old  or,  at  any  rate,  distinctly 
oldish  man  of  rather  corpulent  appearance, 
with  a  clean-shaved  face  and  grey  hair.  I 
thought  at  first  he  was  the  famous  actor 
and  elocutionist,  Mr.  Montgomery  Merri- 
dew,  of  universal  fame,  who  was  to  be  my 
instructor  in  elocution  and  stage  deport- 
ment; but  judge  of  my  surprise  when  I 
discovered  that  the  distinctly  oldish  man 
was  a  pupil  like  myself!  He  gazed  with 
rather  an  envious  look  at  the  other  puj)ils, 


THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN  145 

and  no  doubt  wished  that  he  had  turned 
to  the  art  earlier  in  life;  and  I  felt  he  was 
a  fatherly  and  a  kindly  sort  of  man,  and 
certainly  added  weight  and  dignity  to  the 
class. 

He  was  called  Henry  Smith,  but  pro- 
posed to  change  this  name  for  something 
more  attractive  when  he  got  his  first  en- 
gagement; and  the  other  men  were  named 
respectively  Leonard  Brightwin,  Wilford 
Gooding,  Harold  Crowe,  and  George  Ar- 
thur Dexter. 

Naturally,  I  scanned  their  faces  eagerly 
to  see  if  any  were  destined  to  the  highest 
tragical  walks  of  the  drama;  and  I  found 
that  two  were  evidently  going  to  be  low 
comedians.  These  were  Harold  Crowe 
and  Wilford  Gooding.  Crowe  was  a  fair 
man  with  rather  prominent  eyes,  and  he 
concealed  his  nervousness  under  a  cloak 
of  humour  of  a  trivial  character ;  and  Good- 
ing was  thin,  with  a  very  small  head  and  a 
comic  face,  which  he  could  move  about  in 


146  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

a  most  grotesque  manner.  He  and  Crowe 
already  knew  each  other.  George  Arthur 
Dexter  had  a  keen  and  knowing  face,  and 
was  exceedingly  stylishly  dressed  in  a 
check  suit,  with  an  ivory  skeleton's  head  in 
his  tie,  a  carnation  in  his  buttonhole,  and 
several  rings,  which  appeared  to  have  gen- 
uine precious  stones  in  them,  on  his  hands. 
He  had  an  assertive  presence  and  seemed 
inclined  to  take  the  lead  among  us.  He 
might  easily  have  been  mistaken  for  an 
actor  already,  and  indeed  told  us  that  he 
was  an  old  hand  on  the  amateur  boards. 

He  explained  to  us  that  he  had  only 
come  for  polish,  and  was  n't  really  sure  if 
Mr.  Merridew  would  be  able  to  teach  him 
anything  that  he  did  n't  know  already. 

This  man,  curiously  enough,  was  the 
first  man  I  did  n't  like  in  London.  Of 
course  I  did  n't  like  the  shady  customer 
who  pretended  to  be  Mr.  Martin  Tupper, 
but  I  only  hated  him  afterwards;  whereas, 
in  the  case  of  Dexter,  I  felt  a  feeling  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  147 

dislike  from  the  start.  He  was  so  fearfully 
contented  with  himself,  and  his  clothes,  and 
his  skeleton's  head  and  his  great  histrionic 
gifts. 

But  Leonard  Brightwin  was  a  very  dif- 
ferent sort  of  man.  Genius  blazed  out  of 
his  black  eyes;  he  wore  his  raven  locks 
long,  and  from  time  to  time  tossed  them 
back  from  his  forehead  in  a  very  artistic 
manner.  In  fact,  I  felt  in  the  presence 
of  a  future  leader  of  the  stage.  He  was 
of  medium  height  and  of  shy  and  retiring 
nature;  but  one  could  not  help  feeling  that 
Brightwin  was  born  to  be  a  great  trage- 
dian. T  longed  to  be  his  friend  from  the 
first. 

We  all  fell  into  conversation  of  a  very 
animated  sort,  and  Dexter,  who  greatly 
fancied  his  powers  of  imitating  well-known 
actors,  was  just  doing  Mr.  Edward  Terry 
in  The  Forty  Thieves  (as  he  thought, 
though  it  was  utterly  unlike),  when  the 
door  opened  and  no  less  a  person  than  the 


148  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

renowned  Mr.  jNIontgomery  ^lerridew 
stood  before  us. 

One  saw  the  graceful  abandon  of  the  old 
stager  at  a  glance.  The  way  he  walked, 
the  way  he  extended  his  hand  and  poised 
his  leonine  head  on  his  sinewy  neck  —  all 
showed  the  practised  histrion.  He  was  a 
shapely  man  of  fifty,  at  the  least;  but  such 
was  the  almost  panther-like  grace  of  his 
movements  and  rich  auburn  colour  of  his 
flowing  mustache,  that,  but  for  the  deep 
lines  of  thought  on  his  brow  and  under  his 
eyes,  one  might  have  imagined  him  many 
years  yoimger. 

An  air  of  perfect  assurance  and  the  man- 
ner of  one  accustomed  to  rule,  greatly  dis- 
tinguished Mr.  Merridew.  His  voice  was 
a  magnificent  organ,  under  perfect  control, 
and  everj'^  gesture  and  step  were  timed  and 
studied  to  perfection.  He  was,  in  fact, 
an  embodiment  of  the  art  that  conceals  art. 

He  bowed  on  entering,  not  in  a  servile 
manner,    but    with    a    courtly    familiarity. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  149 

such  as  doubtless  one  sees  when  kings  meet 
kings.  He  appeared  astonished  at  the 
smallness  of  the  class  collected  to  receive 
him;  but  he  concealed  his  dismay  under  a 
nonchalant  air  of  perfect  good-breeding, 
which  I  am  sure  was  a  lesson  in  itself. 

He  greeted  us  each  in  turn  and  insisted 
on  shaking  hands  with  all  of  us.  He  wore 
pince-nez,  while  engaged  in  this  manner, 
and  having  declared  his  pleasure  at  making 
our  acquaintance,  threw  off  the  pince-nez 
with  an  almost  regal  gesture  and  lost  no 
time,  but  bade  us  marshal  ourselves  before 
him,  and  then  began  an  easy  but  most 
illuminating  address  on  the  art  of  stage 
deportment  and  elocution. 

While  engaged  in  this  opening  lecture, 
he  scanned  our  faces  in  turn  with  such  an 
eagle  glance  that  only  George  Dexter  had 
sufficient  cheek  to  return  his  look.  As  for 
the  two  low  comedians,  they  simply  curled 
up  under  it,  and  so  did  I;  and  Brightwin, 
whose  eyes  were  even  more  luminous  than 


150  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Mr.  Merridew's,  let  them  fall  to  the  floor 
before  the  professional's  impassioned  gaze. 
As  for  poor  INIr.  Smith,  he  was,  as  it  were, 
mesmerized  by  the  lecturer  and  kept  his 
eye  fixed  upon  the  great  actor's  face, 
though  evidently  not  wishing  to  do  so. 

Mr.  INIerridew  said  some  beautiful  things 
about  art  and  was,  in  reality,  a  man  of  no 
little  modesty,  considering  his  fame.  He 
certainly  told  us  a  great  deal  about  him- 
self; but  it  was  only  to  encourage  us  and 
show  us  what  we  might  do.  His  career 
had  been  very  picturesque,  and  he  claimed 
for  himself  such  rare  and  brilliant  powers 
that  he  said  he  could  act  anything  and 
everything  —  from  a  billiard  ball  to  Mac- 
beth. I  mention  this  startling  sajdng  to 
show  that  he  allowed  stray  flashes  of 
humour  —  you  might  almost  say  badinage 
—  to  enlighten  his  discourse. 

*'  An  actor,"  he  said,  "  ought  to  be  as 
sensitive  as  a  photogi*aphic  plate.  He 
ought    to   be    able    instantly   to   catch    the 


OF  SEVENTEEN  151 

character  that  he  proposes  to  portray  and 
allow  it  entirely  to  absorb  him  and  soak 
into  every  corner  of  his  soul.  When,  for  in- 
stance, I  played  lago  some  few  years  ago,  I 
ceased  to  be  Montgomery  Merridew  during 
the  whole  progress  of  the  run!  I  was  lago 
—  not  only  when  on  the  boards,  for  so 
thoroughly  had  I  permitted  that  fiend  in 
human  shape  to  permeate  my  being,  that 
again  and  again  I  caught  myself  thinking 
and  feeling  as  lago  thought  and  felt  out- 
side the  precincts  of  the  theatre.  That 
is  an  extreme  case;  and  I  instance  it  to 
show  you  a  little  of  the  extraordinary 
sensibility  of  the  born  actor.  And  not 
only  can  I  play  on  the  instrument  '  man  ' 
and  move  to  tears  or  laughter,  with  the 
ease  of  an  accomj)lished  musician  playing 
on  a  musical  instrument,  but  such  is  my 
intense  feeling  and  emotional  delicacy  that 
I  am  equally  moved  myself  when  I  watch 
another  actor  playing!  The  vibrating 
chords  of  my  soul  respond  to  him  instantly; 


152  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

and  though  I  may  know  that  I  could  i:)rob- 
ably  play  the  part  far  better  myself,  yet 
such  is  my  sympathy  and  understanding, 
that  I  weep  as  readily  as  any  untutored 
shop-boy  in  the  audience  —  provided  only 
that  my  colleague  on  the  stage  strives  hon- 
estly to  hold  the  mirror  up  to  nature." 

He  proceeded  in  this  exalted  strain  for 
some  time,  then  looked  at  his  watch  and 
concluded  his  preliminary  remarks: 

"  Aristotle,  gentlemen,  has  written  a 
famous  work  entitled  The  Poetics,  and  no 
actor,  or  would-be  actor,  can  afford  to  go 
without  it,  I  shall  ask  you  all  to  buy  a 
copy  —  Bohn's  cheap  edition  —  and  pon- 
der very  carefully  what  you  find  there. 
Tragedy  is  a  combination  of  terror  and 
pity.  Through  the  one  you  are  lifted  to 
the  other,  and  the  actor  who  embarks  on  a 
classic  part  must  always  remember  that  he 
is  not  there  merel}^  to  harrow  the  feelings 
of  his  fellow-creatures.  Far  from  it  —  far 
from  it.    By  all  means  let  him  terrify  them 


OF  SEVENTEEN  153 

first  by  the  presentment  of  fearful  pas- 
sions; let  him  freeze  them  to  the  bone  and 
curdle  their  life's  blood,  if  he  can,  by  his 
representation  of  rage,  remorse,  fear,  and 
so  forth ;  but  behind  and  beneath  —  per- 
meating, as  it  were,  the  very  substance  of 
the  soul,  we  must  have  the  direct  appeal 
to  humanity,  to  our  fellow  man  and  woman. 
We  must  remind  them  that  what  we  do  and 
suffer  might  be  done  and  suffered  by  each 
one  of  them,  given  the  dreadful  circum- 
stances ;  and  then,  gentlemen  —  then  what 
have  we  achieved?  Why,  we  have  sum- 
moned compassion  into  the  theatre!  We 
have  awakened  in  each  member  of  the 
audience  the  most  ennobling  emotion  of 
the  human  heart!  And  at  such  times, 
when  playing  in  the  greatest  parts,  I  hare 
felt  through  the  silent,  spellbound  theatre 
an  electric  thrill  for  which  no  human  crea- 
ture was  responsible ;  and  I  have  said,  '  It 
is  the  wings  of  the  angel  of  pity! '  " 

The  noble  man  was  much  moved  by  this 


154  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

magnificent  feat  of  eloquence.  He  blew 
his  nose  on  a  handkerchief  which  was 
obviously  made  of  silk,  and  then,  with  a 
masterly  touch,  turned  to  us  where  we 
stood,  deeply  impressed  by  his  spontaneous 
eloquence  and  came,  as  it  were,  to  earth 
with  a  bound. 

"  Now  we  must  go  through  our  paces, 
gentlemen,"  he  said.  "  Upon  the  occasion 
of  our  next  meeting,  I  will  ask  each  of 
you  to  bring  with  him  the  play  of  Hamlet, 
and  I  shall  cast  it  and  rehearse  a  scene  or 
two.  Thus  the  business  of  elocution  and 
deportment  will  go  hand  in  hand,  and,  at 
the  same  time,  you  will  be  able  to  feel  the 
artist's  pride  in  uttering  words  and  imper- 
sonating characters  that  have  rejoiced 
many  generations  of  men.  But  to-night  I 
shall  ask  each  in  turn  to  recite  before  me 
some  brief,  familiar  passage  that  is  precious 
to  him.  I  shall  thus  learn  a  little  about 
j^our  defects  and  can  give  each  of  you  a 
few  preliminary  hints.    Lastly,  if  time  per- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  155 

mit,  I  shall  myself  speak  a  speech  before 
you  with  the  elocution  and  gesture  proper 
to  it,  and  explain  my  reasons  as  I  pro- 
ceed. I  will  ask  Mr.  Smith,  as  our  senior 
student,  to  begin.  Mount  the  rostrum, 
Mr.  Smith,  and  forget  our  presence.  Let 
the  aura  of  your  poet  enfold  you  as  with 
a  garment,  Mr.  Smith.  Seek  to  be  one 
with  him,  whoever  he  is,  and  in  tune  with 
his  conception  —  of  course,  to  the  best  of 
your  powers." 

I  was  gi-eatly  encouraged  to  find  that 
Mr.  Smith  could  rise  to  this  challenge,  for 
I  'm  sure  I  did  n't  feel  as  if  I  could ;  but 
Mr.  Smith,  without  any  evasion,  bowed  to 
Mr.  Merridew  and  climbed  three  steps  on 
to  a  low  stage  at  the  end  of  the  classroom, 
and  then  said  that  he  intended  to  recite 
the  poet  Shelley's  "  To  a  Skylark." 

"  Not  all,  Mr.  Smith.  There  will  hardly 
be  time  for  all,"  said  the  preceptor.  And 
this,  I  believe,  secretly  upset  Mr.  Smith 
and  made  him  hurried  and  uneasy.     For 


156  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

he  was  a  retiring  man  of  most  delicate 
feelings,  and  the  thought  that  he  might  be 
taking  up  too  much  time  evidently  put  him 
bang  out  of  his  stride,  as  we  say  at  the 
L.A.C. 

Mr.  Merridew  settled  himself  in  his 
chair,  with  the  nonchalant  attitude  of  the 
King  in  Hamlet  during  the  beginning  of 
the  play  scene,  and  Mt.  Smith,  thrusting 
out  his  right  arm  in  a  rather  unmeaning 
way,  set  off.  He  spoke  in  a  hollow  and 
mumbling  voice,  not  suited  to  a  skylark, 
and  instantly  the  dreadful  truth  was  forced 
upon  us  that  he  left  out  the  h's!  He  began 
like  this: 

"  'Ail  to  thee,  blithe  spirit, 
Bird  thou  never  wert, 
That  from  'eaven  or  near  it 

Pourest  thy  full  'eart 
In  profuse  strains  of  unpremeditated  art.  " 

Mr.  Merridew  started  as  though  a  ser- 
pent had  stung  him,  at  the  very  first  word, 
for,  of  course,  to  his  highly  strung  senses 


OF  SEVENTEEN  157 

it  must  have  been  simple  agony;  and  I 
think  Mr.  Smith  knew  there  was  something 
wrong,  too ;  but  he  went  on  about  "  'igher 
still  and  'igher,"  and  gradually  warmed  to 
his  work,  so  that  when  he  came  to  "  Thou 
dost  float  and  run,"  he  actually  tried  to  do 
it  and  stood  on  his  toes  and  fluttered  his 
arms!  It  might  have  answered  fairly  well 
for  a  turkey,  to  say  it  kindly,  but  it  was 
utterly  wrong  for  a  skylark.  One  felt  that 
Mr.  Smith  had  thought  it  all  out  and  taken 
immense  trouble,  and  it  was  rather  sad  in 
a  way  when  the  professor  stopped  him  and 
told  him  to  come  down.  Mr.  Smith  in- 
stantly shrank  up;  and  the  fire  of  recitation 
went  out  of  him  and  he  sneaked  down 
humbly. 

"  It 's  the  aspirate,"  he  said.  "  I  can't 
'elp  it.  I  've  fought  it  for  years ;  but  it 
conquers  me." 

Mr.  Merridew,  however,  was  most  en- 
couraging. 

"  Be  of  good  cheer,"  he  answered.   "  You 


158  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

labour  under  a  common  affliction.  Much 
may  be  done  to  cure  it  with  patience  and 
perseverance.  I  shall  give  you  some  exer- 
cises presently.  And  you  must  choose 
your  recitations  with  closer  regard  to  your 
voice  and  personality.  The  ethereal  and 
the  soaring  don't  become  you,  Mr.  Smith. 
Something  in  the  rugged  and  masculine, 
and  even  grun  manner  we  must  find  for 
you.  '  Eugene  Aram,'  perhaps,  or  '  Christ- 
mas Day  in  the  Workhouse,'  or  '  The 
Brand  of  Cain.'  " 

So  that  finished  off  Mr.  Smith  for  the 
time  being,  and  one  felt,  in  a  curious  sort 
of  way,  that  Aristotle's  pity  and  terror 
were  there  right  enough,  though  not,  of 
course,   as  Mr.   Merridew   exactly   meant. 

"  Now,  Mr.  Dexter,  what  can  you  do  for 
us?"  inquired  our  preceptor,  and  George 
Dexter,  who  had  been  sniggering  rather 
basely  at  Mr.  Smith,  leapt  lightly  to  the 
platform. 

"'Billy's  Rose,'   by   G.   R.    Sims!"  he 


OF  SEVENTEEN  159 

said,  and  instantly  plunged  into  that  very 
pathetic  and  world-famous  recitation.  He 
accompanied  it  with  a  great  deal  of  ges- 
ture, both  of  legs  and  arms,  and  at  the  end, 
when  the  rose  is  given  to  the  angel  Billy 
he  suddenly  snatched  his  carnation  out 
from  under  his  coat,  where  he  had  con- 
cealed it,  and  held  the  flower  aloft  with  an 
expression  of  radiant  and  beatific  excite- 
ment. He  remained  in  this  position  for 
some  moments,  and  I  believe  rather  ex- 
pected that  Mr.  Merridew  was  going  to 
applaud ;  but  he  did  n't.  All  the  great 
man  said  was: 

"  You  don't  finish  with  a  conjuring 
trick,  my  dear  Mr.  Dexter.  The  rose  is 
a  thing  of  the  spirit.  I  have  the  honour  to 
know  the  poet  who  wrote  those  beautiful 
verses  and  the  rose  is,  as  it  were,  allegor- 
ical —  an  essence  of  the  soul.  And  your 
mannerisms  are  thoroughly  bad  and  ama- 
teurish. You  've  walked  at  least  a  quarter 
of  a  mile  since  you  began.     You  are  too 


160  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

aggressive,  too  defiant,  too  noisy.  You 
tear  a  passion  to  tatters,  Mr.  Dexter.  You 
must  learn  to  serve  your  apprenticeship  in 
a  humble  and  chastened  spirit.  You  have 
been  in  a  bad  school  and  there  is  much  to 
undo." 

Of  course,  though  I  still  hated  Dexter, 
I  vras  really  sorry  for  this,  because  I  felt 
it  would  knock  all  the  life  out  of  him  at 
the  very  start  of  his  career.  While  he 
turned  exceedingly  pale  and  dropped  his 
carnation  on  the  floor  and  returned  to  us, 
as  though  he  wished  to  shelter  himself  from 
the  bitter  criticism  of  the  professor,  he  was 
not  really  crushed.  In  fact,  he  whispered 
to  me  the  insulting  word  "  fathead  "  as  he 
rejoined  us;  and  I  knew  that  he  and  Mr. 
Merridew  would  be  deadly  enemies  from 
that  night  forward. 

Then  Harold  Crowe  and  Wilford  Good- 
ing asked  if  they  might  perform  together, 
and  Mr.  ISIerridew  permitted  it;  but  when 
he   found   that    they    proposed   to   imitate 


OF  SEVENTEEN  161 

those  world-renowned  music-hall  entertain- 
ers, known  as  the  "  Two  Macs,"  he  stopped 
them. 

"  No,  gentlemen,"  he  said,  "  far  be  it 
from  me  to  quarrel  with  the  '  Two  Macs.' 
They  are  genuine  humourists,  and  their 
songs  and  dances  and  thoroughly  English 
fun  have  often  entertained  me;  but  we  are 
not  here  to  emulate  the  vagaries  of  eccen- 
tric original  comedians.  Our  purpose  is  to 
learn  to  walk  first  before  we  run,  and  we 
can  develop  our  personal  genius  after- 
wards —  if  we  have  any." 

Unfortunately,  Crowe  and  Gooding 
could  do  nothing  but  imitate  the  "  Two 
Macs,"  so  they  lost  their  chance  for  that 
evening;  and  then  Leonard  Brightwin 
took  his  place  on  the  stage  and  recited 
Antony's  great  speech  from  Julius  Ccesar. 

I  had  been  very  uneasy  as  my  turn  ap- 
proached for  various  reasons,  because,  cu- 
riously enough,  the  only  things  I  knew  by 
heart   were   purely   religious,    and   learned 


162  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

long  ago  in  my  schooldays.  In  a  few 
minutes,  however,  my  anxieties  were 
drowned  in  the  joy  of  listening  to  Leon- 
ard Bright  win,  who  spoke  with  great  force 
and  feeling  and  accompanied  his  words 
with  most  appropriate  expressions  of  the 
face.  I  felt  that  here  was  one  who  would 
certainly  make  the  rest  of  us  look  very 
small. 

Mr.  Merridew  was  pleased  but  guarded. 

"  Quite  good,"  he  said.  "  A  thousand 
faults,  Mr.  Brightwin,  a  thousand  faults; 
but  there  's  ore  in  the  mine  and  we  shall 
bring  it  to  the  surface  presently." 

I  congratulated  Brightwin  at  this  high 
praise,  and  he  was  evidently  much  pleased. 
He  started  to  explain  his  view  of  INIark 
Antony  to  Mr.  Smith,  when  the  professor, 
who  had  begun  to  tire  and  yawn  several 
times,  called  upon  me. 

"Mr.  Corkey,  please;  and  be  brief,  Mr. 
Corkey,  for  the  lesson  has  been  quite  long 
enough." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  163 

"  I  must  tell  you,  sir,"  I  said  firmly, 
"  that  I  only  perfectly  know  '  My  Duty  to 
my  Neighbour.'  " 

Dexter  laughed,  as  I  knew  he  would, 
but  Mr.  Merridew  by  no  means  laughed. 

"  You  could  not  know  anything  better, 
Mr.  Corkey,"  he  answered,  "  but  words 
hallowed  by  —  by  sacred  memories  and  — 
and  —  in  fact  —  no.  It  will  do  for  the 
moment  if  you  just  give  us  the  alphabet  — 
speaking  slowly  and  distinctly,  putting 
character  and  feeling  into  the  letters.  In 
fact,  make  them  interesting," 

I  stared  in  my  great  ignorance  before 
this  amazing  man.  I  felt  that  it  was  quite 
beyond  my  power  to  make  the  alphabet 
interesting,  or  put  character  and  feeling 
into  the  letters;  and  I  told  him  so  hon- 
estly.    I  said: 

"  No  doubt  you  could,  sir;  because  you 
can  act  anything,  from  a  billiard  ball  to 
Macbeth ;  but  it 's  no  good  my  trying,  be- 


104  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

cause  I  have  n't  the  faintest  idea  how  to 
set  about  it." 

"  I  '11  show  you,"  answered  Mr.  INIerri- 
dew.  "  A  thing  of  this  kind,  you  must 
understand,  is  merely  academic  —  an  exer- 
cise, like  a  Chopin  study  —  but  it  will  give 
you  a  glimpse  into  the  expression  and  con- 
trol of  emotions  and  passions,  and  show 
you  how  the  skilled  actor  can  make  bricks 
without  straw  and  something  out  of  noth- 
ing." 

He  rose  from  his  professorial  chair  and 
lightly  ascended  the  steps  to  the  stage. 
Then  he  stood  for  a  moment,  rapt  in 
brooding  thought  of  the  profoundest  char- 
acter, and  then  suddenly  began: 

"A!"  (astonishment  combined  with  joy, 
as  though  he  had  suddenly  met  an  old 
friend,  long  given  up  for  lost).  "B?" 
(a  note  of  inquirj^  uttered  with  tremulous 
emotion,  as  tliough  much  depended  upon 
it).  "C"  (gladly,  with  great  relief  and 
a    nod    of    the    head).      "D  — E  — F" 


OF  SEVENTEEN  165 

(spoken  loudly  and  swiftly  with  an  ex- 
pression of  increasing  satisfaction  and 
happiness.  "G!"  (a  sudden  peal  of 
laughter  which  shook  the  room  and  echoed 
from  the  walls).  "H"  (more  laughter; 
gradually  subsiding) .  "I  —  J  "  (laughter 
dying  out  and  at  last  completely  at  an 
end).  "  K!  "  (a  loud  and  ringing  note  of 
alarm  accompanied  by  the  raising  of  the 
hands  to  the  breast).  "L!"  (the  alarm 
increasing,  the  hands  lifted  gradually  and 
thrown  back,  the  face  showing  considerable 
fear).  "M!"  (uttered  with  immense 
relief,  as  though  the  danger  was  past,  but 
the  effect  still  apparent  in  nervous  turning 
of  the  head  to  right  and  left).  "N  — O 
—  P!"  (three  gracious  bows  in  different 
directions,  as  though  three  welcome  per- 
sons had  come  on  to  the  stage  to  meet  the 
professor) .  "  Q  —  R  —  S  "  (three  ges- 
tures each  different  from  the  others,  indi- 
cating that  the  professor  was  shaking 
hands    with    each    of    the    new    arrivals). 


166  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"T!"  (a  sudden  drawing  back,  as  though 
the  last  of  the  arrivals  was  n't  behaving 
nicely).  "U!!"  (a  most  tragic  and  sud- 
den explosion,  accompanied  by  a  dagger- 
thrust  which  settled  the  last  of  the  arrivals 
and  laid  him  dead  at  the  professor's  feet). 
"V  — W!!!"  (a  sudden  half-turn,  dur- 
ing which  the  momentary  triumph  over  the 
last  of  the  arrivals  was  evidently  swept 
away  by  the  onslaught  of  the  others). 
"X!!"  (a  violent  struggle,  in  which  the 
professor  was  thrown  this  way  and  that 
by  his  invisible  antagonists).  "Y!!"  (a 
long-drawn,  deadly  hiss  of  rage,  accom- 
panied by  a  flash  of  victory  in  the  eye  and 
a  rapid  dagger-stroke,  which  prostrated 
another  foe).  "  Z!!!  "  (a  loud  cry  of  acute 
despair;  both  hands  pressed  over  the  heart 
and  the  professor  sank  to  his  knees,  thus 
indicating  that  his  remaining  foe  had  been 
too  much  for  him). 

It  was  a  drama  in  a  minute  and  a  half, 
and  we  were  all  so  much  moved  that  we 


OF  SEVENTEEN  167 

burst  into  loud  applause.  Then  the  pro- 
fessor regained  his  feet  gracefully  and 
bowed,  as  though  we  were  an  audience  of  a 
thousand  people.  This  magnificent  inspi- 
ration, executed  with  consummate  aplomb, 
almost  bewildered  me  and  Mr.  Smith  and 
Brightwin  by  its  magnificence.  It  showed, 
too,  the  sort  of  man  who  was  going  to  take 
us  in  hand. 

But  Mr.  Merridew  made  nothing  of  it. 
It  was  just  a  superb  bit  of  spontaneous 
acting,  dashed  off  as  Michael  Angelo  would 
dash  off  a  statue,  or  Beethoven  a  sym- 
phony. 

In  a  way  it  was  rather  depressing,  be- 
cause it  showed  how  much  lay  before  us. 
But  we  were  all  excited  and  hopeful  on 
the  whole.  Even  Mr.  Smith  felt  a  sort  of 
divine  fire  in  his  veins.  He  offered  to 
stand  Brightwin  and  me  some  supper  after 
the  lesson  was  over,  and  we  gladly  con- 
sented to  let  him  do  so. 

Mr.   Smith  told  us  about  himself  pres- 


168    THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

ently  —  how  he  had  come  into  a  little 
money  and  was  now  in  a  position  to  give 
up  his  work  (which,  he  said,  had  been  of  a 
subordinate  character,  but  did  n't  specify) 
and  seriously  devote  himself  to  the  stage. 

We  listened  to  him  very  patiently  and 
made  a  huge  supper. 

And  afterwards,  when  we  had  seen  Mr. 
Smith  home  to  his  wife  and  family  off  the 
Tottenham  Court  Road,  Brightwin  said 
that  to  be  stage-struck  at  jMr.  Smith's  age 
and  with  his  figure  was  a  tragedy  of  the 
deepest  dye. 

"  There  are  only  certain  parts  he  could 
play,"  explained  Brightwin  to  me;  "but 
his  voice  belongs  to  quite  a  different  order 
of  parts.  He  has  the  voice  of  a  tragedian 
and  the  body  of  a  second  low  comedian. 
In  fact,  there  is  no  hope  for  him  that  I 
can  see. 

"He  might,  however,  start  a  theatre; 
which  would  be  hope  for  us,  if  we  kept  in 
with  him,"  added  Brightwin  thoughtfully. 


IX 


MY  victorious  career  received  a  very 
serious  check  about  this  period. 
I  had,  of  course,  bought  Aris- 
totle's Poetics  and  a  cheap  edition  of  Ham- 
let, and  on  one  or  two  occasions  I  much 
regret  to  say  that  ^Ir.  Westonshaugh,  the 
best  and  kindest  of  men,  had  found  me 
reading  them  when  I  ought  to  have  been 
registering  pohcies  of  insurance. 

He  had  rather  a  stealthy  way  of  ap- 
proaching the  staff  of  the  Country  Depart- 
ment from  the  rear,  and,  though  a  large 
man,  revealed  the  instincts  of  a  hunter 
wonderfully  developed;  so  that  he  was 
often  upon  his  game,  which  generally  con- 
sisted of  junior  clerks,  before  the  quarry 
was  roused  and  aware  of  its  danger. 

The  first  time  he  cautioned  me;  but  the 
second  time  I  grieve  to  relate  that  he  re- 


170  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

ported  me.  It  was,  of  course,  his  duty  to 
do  so;  and  I  believe  he  regretted  the 
necessity.  But  so  it  was ;  and  it  meant  that 
I  had  to  go  before  the  Secretary  of  the 
Apollo  and  meet  him  face  to  face,  much 
to  my  disadvantage. 

The  Secretary  was,  of  course,  the  pivot 
round  which  the  whole  office  turned.  The 
Directors  themselves  seldom  dared  to  inter- 
fere with  him;  for  he  was  the  hero  of  a 
thousand  fights,  so  to  say,  and  had  climbed 
to  the  giddy  altitude  of  the  secretarial 
chair  after  a  lifetime  spent  in  heroic  and 
successful  efforts  to  advance  the  prosperity 
of  the  Apollo  Fire  Office.  His  fame  nat- 
urally extended  far  beyond  the  walls  of  the 
Apollo.  He  was  known  throughout  the 
whole  insurance  world  as  a  light  in  the 
darkness.  He  had  written  more  than  one 
book  on  the  subject;  and  the  Insurance 
Guide,  the  journal  of  the  insurance  craft, 
seldom  appeared  without  some  respectful 
allusion  to  his  great  fame.     I  believe  he 


OF  SEVENTEEN  171 

was  a  sort  of  king  over  the  secretaries  of 
other  Fire  Offices;  at  any  rate,  nobody  ever 
pretended  there  was  anybody  to  equal  him. 
He  was  called  Septimus  Trott,  Esquire; 
and  there  came  a  gloomy  morning  when  I 
stood  before  him  alone  in  the  silence  of  the 
secretarial  chamber.  But,  of  course,  the 
interest  was  profound,  for  my  fate  might 
be  said  to  hang  in  the  balance.  I  had  seen 
Mr.  Trott  far  off  on  several  occasions,  and 
had  once,  in  the  Board  Room,  where  I 
went  with  a  message,  witnessed  the  solemn 
sight  of  him  conversing  on  equal  terms 
with  six  Directors  simultaneously,  and 
easily  making  them  think  as  he  thought, 
thanks  to  his  enormous  experience  and  easy 
flow  of  words;  but  this  was  the  first  time 
I  had  approached  him  in  propria  persona, 
as  we  say. 

He  was  of  a  sable  silvered,  with  a  florid 
complexion,  and  his  eyes  had  a  piercing 
quality.  He  wore  gold-rimmed  glasses 
divided  horizontally,  so  that  when  he  looked 


172  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

through  the  tops  of  them  he  could  see  men 
and  things  about  him,  and  when  he  looked 
through  the  bottom  he  could  read  docu- 
ments and  data,  or  see  to  write  himself  if 
necessary. 

He  now  looked  through  the  upper  story 
of  his  glasses  and  focused  me  with  an  ex- 
pression that  I  had  never  seen  before  on 
any  human  countenance.  It  was  not  pity, 
by  any  means,  and  it  was  not  scorn.  You 
could  n't  say  that  Mr.  Trott  was  angry ; 
but  then  you  certainly  could  n't  say  that 
he  was  pleased.  He  regarded  me  thought- 
fully, yet  without  what  you  might  call 
much  emotion.  He  was  perfectly  calm, 
yet  under  his  easy  self-control  I  soon  found 
that  he  concealed  a  good  deal  of  quiet  an- 
noyance at  what  he  had  heard  about  me. 
Having  studied  my  features,  which  I  had 
striven  to  make  as  apologetic  as  possible, 
he  dropped  to  the  lower  story  of  his 
glasses,  and  I  perceived  that  he  had  open 
before  him  some  registers  of  my  writing. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  173 

They  evidently  dismayed  him,  and  for 
some  time  he  said  not  a  word.  At  length 
he  broke  a  silence  which  was  becoming  ex- 
ceedingly painful. 

"  Mr.  Corkey,"  he  exclaimed,  "  I  believe 
you  are  in  your  eighteenth  year!" 

"  Yes,  sir,"  I  answered.  "  It  will  be 
my  eighteenth  birthday  in  the  autumn." 

"  And  do  you  desire  to  celebrate  that 
event  with  us,  or  elsewhere,  Mr.  Corkey?" 
he  inquired. 

I  told  him  that  I  greatly  hoped  to  cele- 
brate it  with  him  —  at  least,  with  the 
Country  Department  of  the  Apollo;  and 
I  breathed  again  in  secret,  for  this  showed 
that  I  was  not  going  to  be  dismissed. 

Indeed,  Mr.  Blades  had  told  me  that  a 
man  was  always  cautioned  once. 

"  They  never  fire  you  the  first  time," 
was  his  forcible  expression. 

But  the  revulsion  of  feeling  caused  by 
knowing  that  I  was  saved  made  me  strike 
rather  too  joyful  a  note  with  Mr.  Trott. 


174  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"  I  'm  very  sorry  indeed  that  JNIr.  Wes- 
tonshaiigh  had  to  report  me,  sir,"  I  said, 
in  a  hearty  sort  of  voice.  "  It  was  well 
deserved,  and  I  promise  you  it  shan't  oc- 
cur again." 

But  the  Secretary  did  n't  seem  to  want 
my  views.  In  fact,  he  held  up  his  hand 
for  silence. 

"  You  are  here  to  listen,  Mr.  Corkey," 
he  replied.  "  Now,  before  me  I  have  some 
of  your  recent  work.  Will  you  kindly 
consider  these  pages  in  an  impartial  spirit, 
and  tell  me  what  you  think  of  them?  I 
invite  your  opinion." 

As  bad  luck  would  have  it,  before  him 
were  some  registers  of  policies  that  I  had 
done  under  very  unusual  pressure.  In 
fact,  I  had  made  a  bet  with  a  chap  called 
JNIason  that  I  would  register  twenty  "  short 
period "  policies  quicker  than  he  would 
register  twenty  of  the  same.  My  friend, 
Dicky  Travers,  held  the  stakes,  which 
amounted  to  a  shilling  a  side,  and  I  won 


OF  SEVENTEEN  175 

by  one  "  short  period "  policy  in  record 
time. 

These  things,  naturally,  I  did  not  tell 
my  judge,  for  they  would  only  have  hurt 
him  and  led  to  Mason.  Therefore,  I 
merely  regarded  my  handiwork  with  honest 
scorn  and  an  expression  of  contempt,  and 
said  the  writing  was  not  worthy  of  the 
Apollo  Fire  Office. 

"  I  had  come  to  the  same  conclusion," 
said  Mr.  Septimus  Trott.  "  We  are  of 
one  mind,  Mr.  Corkey.  Now,  I  appeal  to 
your  honour  as  a  gentleman,  and  as  one  who 
is  drawing  a  good  salary  here  —  I  appeal 
to  you,  Mr.  Corkey,  to  do  your  work  in 
future  so  that  we  may  respect  you  and 
value  your  services,  and  not  deplore  them. 
Remember  henceforth,  Mr.  Corkey,  that 
from  ten  until  four,  or  later,  as  the  occa- 
sion demands,  we  have  a  right  to  your 
whole  time  and  energy  and  attention  and 
intelligence.  To  deny  us  that  right,  and 
to   offer  us   less   than  your   best,   is   quite 


176  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

unworthy  of  you,  and  neither  just  nor 
honest  to  your  masters.  Good  morning, 
Mr.  Corkey;  i  feel  sure  that  I  shall  not 
have  to  speak  again." 

I  did  not  know  what  to  answer,  for  this 
exceedingly  fine  man  had  made  me  feel 
both  uncomfortable  and  mean.  I  had, 
however,  to  say  something,  so  thanked  him 
and  promised  that  he  should  never  be 
bothered  by  me  any  more.  But  he  had 
already  dismissed  the  subject  and  was 
biu'ied  in  a  pile  of  complicated  documents, 
which  were  no  doubt  destined  to  melt 
under  his  hands  like  the  dew  upon  the 
fleece. 

I  returned  calmly  to  my  department 
and  wrapped  myself  in  silence  as  with  a 
garment.  But  I  concealed  a  bruised  heart, 
as  the  saying  is,  and  determined  to  rectif}" 
this  uni^leasant  event  as  swiftly  as  possible. 
I  decided  to  stop  after  hours  for  six  con- 
secutive nights  and  write  till  eight,  or  even 
nine  o'clock,  and  so  produce  an  amount  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  177 

work  during  the  current  account  that 
should  delight  Mr.  Westonshaugh  and 
gratify  Mr.  Trott,  if  he  ever  heard  about 
it.  I  wanted,  before  everything,  to  show 
them  I  bore  no  malice,  but  quite  the  con- 
trary. 

Mr.  Blades  thought  my  idea  good,  and 
that  very  night  I  stopped  on  and  on,  long 
after  the  staff  had  gone.  It  was  a  weird 
and  interesting  thing  to  be  alone  with  my 
solitary  gaslight  in  that  huge  and  empty 
office.  All  was  profound  silence,  save 
where  my  industrious  pen  steadily  regis- 
tered policy  after  policy.  Here  and  there 
out  of  the  darkness  glimmered  a  knob  of 
brass  or  some  such  thing,  like  the  watchful 
eye  of  a  beast  of  prey,  and  far  below  one 
heard  the  occasional,  eerie  rattle  of  a  han- 
som, or  cry  of  a  human  voice  in  the  empty 
City.  In  all  that  huge  hive  of  industry 
only  I  appeared  to  be  humming!  It  was 
a  great  thought  in  its  way.  And  yet  I  felt 
the  presence  of  my  colleagues  in  a  ghostly 


178  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

sort  of  fashion,  and  knew  where  the  war- 
like Bassett  sat,  and  the  musical  Wardle, 
and  the  sporting  Tomhnson,  and  so  on. 
But,  of  course,  they  were  all  far  away  in 
the  bosoms  of  their  families,  or  elsewhere, 
as  the  case  might  be. 

And  then  came  a  strange  experience  — 
the  event  of  a  lifetime,  or,  at  any  rate,  the 
event  of  mine  so  far,  for  suddenly  and 
without  anything  much  in  the  way  of  pre- 
monitory symptoms,  I  got  an  urgent  crav- 
ing to  write  a  poem!  It  is  impossible  to 
say  how  it  came,  or  why;  but  there  it  was. 
My  fatal  experiences  of  that  day,  and  being 
so  sorry  for  myself,  and  one  thing  and  an- 
other, depressed  me  to  a  most  unusual  flat- 
ness; and  then  nature,  apparently  rebelling 
against  this  flatness,  urged  me  to  write  a 
poem  upon  a  dire  and  fearful  subject. 

You  might  have  thought  that  I  should 
have  taken  refuge  from  the  troubles  of  the 
morning  by  writing  something  gladsome 
and  joyous,  or  even  a  regular,  right-down 


OF  SEVENTEEN  179 

hymn,  with  hopeful  allusions  to  higher 
things ;  but  far  from  it,  owing  to  the  gloom 
of  the  silent  office,  or  the  gloom  of  my 
mind,  or  perhaps  both  together,  I  produced 
stanza  after  stanza  of  the  most  deathly  and 
grim  poetry  you  could  find  in  the  language. 
It  was  called  "The  Witches'  Sabbath," 
and  I  amazed  myself  by  the  ease  with 
which  I  handled  corpse-candles,  gouts  of 
blood,  the  gallows  tree,  ravens,  owls,  bats, 
lightning,  the  mutter  of  thunder,. the  stroke 
of  Doom,  spectres,  demons,  hags,  black 
cats,  broomsticks,  and,  in  fact,  every  dread- 
ful image  you  can  possibly  imagine  from 
the  classics  at  large.  These  things  simply 
rolled  off  my  pen;  I  could  hardly  write 
fast  enough  to  catch  up  with  the  dance  of 
horrors  which  seemed  to  get  worse  and 
worse  in  every  stanza;  and  I  remember 
wondering,  while  my  nib  flew,  that  if  this 
ghastly  thing  was  the  result  of  a  mild  and 
temperate  rebuke  from  Mr.  Septimus 
Trott,  what  sort  of  poem  I  should  have 


180  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

made  if  he  had  dealt  bitterly  and  sarcas- 
tically and  cruelly  with  me.  I  stoj)ped  to 
examine  the  question,  and  finally  decided 
that  it  was  the  great  patience  and  tender- 
ness of  Mr.  Trott  that  had  reduced  me  to 
this  black  depth  of  despair;  and  I  believed 
that  if  he  had  slated  me  with  all  the  force 
of  barbed  invective  undoubtedly  at  his 
command,  I  should  have  gone  to  the  other 
extreme  and  not  stopped  overtime,  and 
been  reckless  and  ferocious  and  mad,  and 
very  likely  have  produced  a  wild  drinking- 
song,  or  some  profane  limerick  of  a  far 
lower  quality  than  this  stately  poem  with 
all  its  horrors. 

One  verse  especially  pleased  me,  and  I 
set  it  down  here  without  hesitation,  because 
the  time  was  actually  coming  when  my 
poem  would  see  the  glory  of  print  —  not, 
of  course,  that  I  should  see  the  glory  of 
anything  else  in  the  way  of  reward.  But 
merely  to  be  in  print  glorifies  one  for  a 
long  time. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  181 

Through  a  dim  gloaming  with  the  hurtling  crash 
And  thunder  of  their  batlike  wings  they  came. 
Their  tongues  drip  poison  and  their  eyes  they  flash ; 
And  twenty  thousand  others  did  the  same." 

The  effect  of  this  horrible  poem  was  en- 
tirely to  restore  my  happiness;  and  hope, 
long  a  stranger  to  my  heart,  as  they  say, 
returned,  like  the  dove  to  the  ark.  I  sim- 
ply rejoiced  at  the  poem.  I  stopped  regis- 
tering policies  for  that  night  and  copied 
out  the  twelve  verses  of  "  The  Witches' 
Sabbath "  carefully.  I  said  farewell  to 
the  messengers  whose  duty  it  was  to  guard 
the  Apollo  by  night;  and  I  took  home  my 
poem,  filled  with  a  great  longing  to  read 
it  to  Aunt  Augusta.  She  consented  to 
hear  it  and  was  much  interested;  and  so 
surprised  and  pleased  did  she  appear  to  be 
that  I  had  not  the  heart  to  tell  her  about 
the  sorrowful  thing  that  led  to  it. 

The  next  morning  my  poem  was  the 
first  thought  in  my  mind,  and  I  read  it 
carefully  through  before  getting  up.     The 


182  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

glow  had  rather  gone  out  of  it;  still,  it 
was  good.  And  I  considered  whether  I 
should  read  it  at  the  office  to  Mr.  Blades 
and  others.  But,  strangely  enough,  though 
my  affection  for  Mr.  Blades  was  deep  and 
lasting,  as  well  it  might  be,  considering 
all  his  goodness,  something  seemed  to 
whisper  to  me  that  he  would  not  much 
like  "The  Witches'  Sabbath."  I  had  a 
wild  idea  of  asking  Wardle  to  set  it  to 
music,  but  second  thoughts  proved  best, 
as  so  often  happens,  and  I  just  kept  the 
poem  in  my  desk  and  waited  till  the  next 
lesson  at  the  Dramatic  School.  For  I  felt 
that  in  the  genial  atmosphere  of  tragic  art 
my  poem  would  be  more  at  ease  than  in 
a  hive  of  industry. 

I  improved  it  a  great  deal  before  the 
time  came  for  the  next  meeting  with  Mr. 
Merridew.  Not,  of  course,  that  I  was  go- 
ing to  show  it  to  him;  but  I  felt  I  should 
have  courage  to  submit  it  to  my  fellow- 
pupil,  Brightwin,  and  ask  him  for  his  can- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  183 

did  opinion  upon  it.  Of  course,  measured 
according  to  Aristotle,  it  might  have  been 
found  wanting;  because  there  was  simply 
not  a  spark  of  pity  about  it.  But  the 
terror  was  there  all  right. 

To  close  this  rather  painful  chapter,  I 
may  mention  that  I  stuck  to  the  resolve 
to  work  overtime  for  a  week,  but  was  not 
rewarded  by  inventing  another  poem. 
However,  the  result  seemed  highly  favour- 
able, for  Mr.  Westonshaugh  complimented 
me  on  my  work  in  the  account,  and  showed 
a  manly  inclination  to  let  the  dead  past 
bury  its  dead,  as  they  say. 


X 


THE  rehearsal  of  the  first  scene  of 
Hamlet,  conducted  by  Mr.  ]Mont- 
gomery  INIerridew,  went  off  with 
great  verve.  We  were  all  very  eager  to 
please  him  and  there  was  naturally  a  good 
deal  of  excitement  among  us  to  know  how 
he  would  cast  the  parts. 

He  decided  that  Leonard  Brightwin 
should  be  Horatio  and  George  Dexter 
Marcellus.  I  was  Bernardo,  and  Harold 
Crowe  took  the  rather  minor  part  of  Fran- 
cisco. JNIr.  Henry  Smith  had  the  honour 
of  playing  the  ghost,  and  it  was  very  val- 
uable to  him  for  stage  deportment  and 
gesture;  but  not  much  use  in  the  way  of 
his  Jis,  because  the  ghost  does  not  make  a 
single  remark  in  the  first  scene.  Never- 
theless, after  Horatio,  who  was  easily  the 
best,  came  Mr.  Smith.     In  fact,  he  quite 


THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN  185 

suggested  "  the  Majesty  of  buried  Den- 
mark," in  my  opinion,  though  he  did  n't 
manage  his  hands  well,  and  put  rather  too 
much  expression  into  his  face  for  a  ghost. 

Dexter  as  Marcellus  was  bad.  He  made 
JMarcellus  a  bounder,  and  when  he  said, 
referring  to  the  ghost,  "  Shall  I  strike  at 
it  with  my  partisan?  "  you  felt  it  was  just 
the  sort  of  utterly  caddish  idea  that  Dexter 
would  have  had.  My  rendering  of  Ber- 
nardo was  not  well  thought  of,  I  regret 
to  say.  Mr.  Merridew  explained  that  I 
must  avoid  the  sin  of  overacting. 

He  said: 

"  You  must  correct  your  perspective, 
Mr.  Corkey,  and  remember  that  the  dram- 
atist designed  Bernardo  for  an  honest 
but  simple  soldier.  He  is,  we  see,  punc- 
tual and  we  have  every  reason  to  believe 
him  an  efficient  member  of  the  corps  to 
which  he  belonged.  He  is,  moreover,  an 
officer;  but  more  we  do  not  know.  You 
impart  to  him  an  air  of  mystery  and  im- 


186  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

portance  that  are  calculated  to  arrest  the 
audience  and  make  them  expect  wonderful 
things  of  him,  which  he  is  not  going  to 
perform.  In  the  matter  of  deportment, 
Mr.  Corkey,  a  man  of  your  inches  cannot 
be  too  careful.  Your  legs  —  you  under- 
stand I  don't  speak  offensively,  but  prac- 
tically —  your  legs  are  long  and  thin. 
They  are,  in  fact,  the  sort  of  legs  that 
challenge  the  groundlings.  It  behoves  you, 
therefore,  to  manage  them  with  perfect 
propriety;  to  tone  them  down,  as  it  were, 
and  keep  them  as  much  out  of  the  picture 
as  possible." 

I  very  soon  found,  when  it  came  to 
stage  deportment  in  earnest,  that  I  had  not 
time  left  to  overact  Bernardo.  In  fact, 
when  I  once  began  to  grasp  the  great  diffi- 
culties of  walking  about  on  the  stage  with 
the  art  that  conceals  art,  I  had  no  intelli- 
gence left  for  acting  the  part  at  all,  and 
my  second  rendering  of  Bernardo  was  col- 
ourless, though  my  legs  were  better. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  187 

After  a  third  rehearsal  Wilford  Gooding 
took  my  place,  and  he  gave  a  very  different 
reading.  In  fact,  when  he  and  his  friend 
Harold  Crowe  found  themselves  together 
on  the  stage,  they  showed  a  decided  incli- 
nation to  repeat  their  former  imitation  of 
the  "  Two  Macs,"  and  Mr.  Merridew  re- 
proved them  angrily. 

"  You  are  here  to  work,  not  to  fool, 
gentlemen,"  he  said,  "  and  if  you  think  the 
battlements  of  Elsinore  by  moonlight  at 
the  beginning  of  Hamlet  is  the  proper 
place  to  be  funny,  then  let  me  tell  you 
you  have  mistaken  your  vocation." 

A  rehearsal,  in  fact,  has  to  be  conducted 
with  deadly  earnestness,  and  for  beginners 
to  take  it  in  a  casual  or  lightsome  spirit  is 
a  very  great  mistake.  There  is  nothing 
lightsome  about  it. 

Mr.  Merridew  directed  us  to  buy  a 
further  book,  written  by  himself,  on  the 
subject  of  voice  production.  It  contained 
throat     exercises     for     strengthening     the 


188  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

larynx  and  diaphragm  and  vocal  chords, 
and  so  on;  and  among  other  thmgs,  for  a 
full  hour  every  day  we  had  to  go  into  some 
private  place  and  shout  the  vowels  with  the 
full  blast  of  our  lungs. 

"  It  will  make  a  great  deal  of  noise, 
and  people  won't  like  you  for  doing  it," 
prophesied  Mr.  Merridew,  "  but  you  must 
not  mind  a  little  opposition.  Your  voices 
naturally  want  quality  and  tone,  and  these 
can  only  be  got  with  severe  practice.  Rec- 
ollect that  merely  to  speak  is  useless;  you 
must  shout." 

He  told  us  where  to  buy  his  book,  which 
fortunately  cost  no  more  than  sixpence  — 
in  fact,  only  fourpence-halfpenny  in 
reality. 

During  this  lesson  Mr.  Merridew  had  to 
leave  us  for  a  short  time,  to  attend  a  meet- 
ing of  the  Directors  of  the  Dramatic 
School;  and  while  he  was  away  I  ventured 
to  show  Leonard  Brightwin  my  poem  en- 
titled "  The  Witches'  Sabbath."     He  read 


OF  SEVENTEEN  189 

it  with  great  interest  and  was  much  struck 
by  it. 

"  I  'd  no  idea  you  were  a  writer,"  he 
said;  and  I  told  him  I  hadn't  either; 
but  he  believed  it  was  in  me.  He,  too, 
was  a  writer,  and  he  offered  to  intro- 
duce me  to  a  friend  of  his  who  was  an 
editor. 

A  glimpse  of  literary  life  was,  of  course, 
worth  almost  anything  to  me,  and  I  said 
that  I  should  be  exceedingly  thankful  to 
meet  a  professional  editor,  if  he  did  n't 
think  such  a  thing  was  above  me.  Then 
he  explained  that  his  friend,  Mr.  Bulger, 
was  an  enthusiast  of  the  drama  and  edited 
a  penny  paper  called  Thespis. 

"  He  owns  it  and  does  everything  him- 
self but  print  it,"  explained  Brightwin. 
"  It  is  not  strictly  self-supporting  yet,  but 
the  amateurs  read  it  regularly,  for  he  de- 
votes a  good  deal  of  attention  to  their  per- 
formances. I  often  go  and  criticise  them 
for   him.      He   pays   expenses    and   hopes 


190  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

some  day  to  do  more  than  that.  I  write  a 
good  deal  for  him.  My  belief  is  that  he 
would  publish  that  poem  in  his  paper, 
though,  of  course,  I  can't  promise." 

With  the  kindness  and  enthusiasm  of 
the  true  creator  for  an  inferior  artist, 
Brightwin  promised  to  show  the  poem  to 
Mr.  Bulger,  and  I  was  still  thanking  him 
most  gratefully  when  our  preceptor  re- 
turned. 

His  face  was  gloomy,  but  he  did  not  di- 
vulge the  reason,  and  he  proceeded  with 
the  rehearsal. 

An  event  of  considerable  interest  over- 
took me  an  hour  later,  when  the  evening's 
work  was  at  an  end.  As  I  left  the  school 
I  met  an  old  acquaintance  of  the  opposite 
sex,  and  instantly  recognised  the  grey- 
eyed  girl  who  was  waiting  at  the  pit  door 
of  the  Lyceum  on  the  memorable  occasion 
when  I  fainted.  She  remembered  me,  too, 
and  was  able  to  tell  me  the  details  of  the 
event  after  I  had  lost  consciousness. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  191 

She  was  a  pupil  like  myself,  only  she 
belonged  to  the  girls'  class. 

"  They  ain't  going  to  allow  mixed  acting 
for  the  first  six  months,"  she  said. 
"  Funny,  ain't  it?  You  'd  think  it  was  as 
tricky  as  mixed  bathing.  How  are  you 
getting  on? " 

I  told  her  of  Mr.  Merridew  and  Hamlet; 
and  she  told  me  that  there  were  seven 
girls  in  her  class,  and  that  none  of  them 
could  "  act  for  nuts,"  to  use  her  own  forci- 
ble expression. 

An  oldish  woman  had  come  to  see  the 
grey-eyed  girl  home,  and  when  I  offered 
to  accompany  them  to  their  door,  the  old- 
ish woman  refused  in  peremptory  tones. 
In  fact,  you  might  almost  have  thought 
she  regarded  me  as  a  shady  character.  It 
transpired  that  she  was  the  cook  of  the 
grey-eyed  girl's  mother,  and  had  been  told 
off  to  the  service  of  seeing  the  pupil  to  and 
from  the  classes  at  the  Dramatic  School. 
Before  the  cook's  rebuff  I  had,  of  course, 


192  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

to  explain  that  I  was  also  a  pupil  at  the 
school,  and  a  person  of  the  most  honourable 
behaviour  where  the  fair  sex  is  concerned; 
but  the  cook  was  not  prepared  to  argue, 
and  hurried  away  her  charge  without  more 
words. 

I  met  the  grey-eyed  girl  again,  however, 
the  very  next  evening  —  at  a  first-night 
—  and  we  enjoyed  an  uninterrupted  con- 
versation of  three  hours  before  the  doors 
opened.  Thus  a  friendship  was  established 
of  the  most  interesting  character;  for  we 
found  that  we  had  much  in  common,  and 
I  was  able  to  tell  her  several  things  which 
she  did  not  know. 

She  was  not  a  happy  girl,  for  her  par- 
ents only  allowed  her  to  study  for  the  stage 
under  protest,  and  her  family  was  entirely 
against  her  and  of  a  very  unsympathetic 
turn  of  mind;  but  she  felt  that,  sooner  or 
later,  she  would  triumph.  She  indicated 
by  certain  allusions  to  my  necktie  and 
hands  that  I  interested  her.     She  consid- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  193 

ered  that  I  had  artist's  hands,  which  in  its 
turn  interested  me  a  great  deal,  because 
my  aunt  had  noticed  it  as  well  as  this  pen- 
etrating, grey-eyed  girl;  and  in  return  I 
ventui'ed  to  tell  her  that  her  eyes  were  ex- 
ceedingly remarkable.  I  hinted  that  I 
wrote  poetry  as  well  as  acted,  and,  getting 
rather  above  myself,  as  we  say,  told  her 
that  a  poem  of  mine  would  probably  be  ap- 
pearing in  a  well-known  theatrical  journal 
called  Thespis  at  no  distant  date.  I  'm 
afraid  in  my  excitement  I  even  hinted  I 
should  be  paid  for  it,  which  was  going  too 
far. 

She  said: 

"Lor!  Fancy!"  Then,  after  a  pause, 
she  remarked,  looking  at  me  sideways  un- 
der her  eyelids,  that  perhaps  I  should  be 
making  poems  to  her  eyes  next,  since  I 
seemed  to  think  they  were  "a  bit  of  all 
right."  The  idea  had  not  occurred  to  me; 
but  now,  of  course,  my  chivalric  instincts, 
hitherto  somewhat   dormant,   came  to   my 


194  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

aid,  and  I  assured  her  that  the  jioem  was 
only  a  question  of  time.  In  fact,  we  may 
be  said  rather  to  have  gone  it,  and  when 
the  doors  were  open  and  we  entered  the 
theatre,  I  sat  beside  her. 

I  may  state  here  that  I  had  no  objection 
to  girls  as  a  class,  or  in  a  general  way  — 
in  fact,  rather  the  contrary,  if  anything. 
But  they  were  not  so  interesting  to  me  as 
men;  and  I  also  understood  that  there  is 
not  a  rose  without  a  thorn,  as  the  poet  says. 

There  are  nocturnal  girls  in  London 
known,  generally  speaking,  as  "  light." 
They  are  as  common  as  blackberries  in  the 
Sacred  Writings,  and  Shakespeare  and  the 
classics  generally;  and  I  may  say  that  they 
have  often  linked  their  arms  in  mine,  when 
I  have  been  returning  home  after  nightfall 
through  some  of  the  main  London  thor- 
oughfares. 

The  first  time  this  happened,  being  new 
to  their  unconventional  ways,  I  explained 
to  two  girls,  who  approached  me  simulta- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  195 

neously,  that  I  did  n't  know  them.  Where- 
upon, with  the  swift  repartee  for  which 
this  class  is  famous,  they  told  me  that  they 
were  the  Duchess  of  Edinburgh  and  the 
Empress  of  Russia,  and  that  they  were 
stopping  with  Queen  Victoria  at  Bucking- 
ham Palace,  and  had  just  popped  out  for 
a  breather  before  supper.  Of  course,  the 
right  thing  to  do  is  to  take  these  dashing 
meteors  in  their  own  spirit;  and  when  they 
invited  me  to  return  with  them  to  the 
palace,  I  explained  that  some  other  night 
I  should  be  delighted  to  do  so,  but  that  I 
was  bound  for  Marlborough  House  my- 
self on  this  occasion,  and  already  half  an 
hour  late.  They  appreciated  the  hon  mot 
and  rather  took  to  me.  Though  doubtless 
they  might  have  been  called  bad  girls,  no- 
body would  have  called  them  bad  com- 
pany. They  had  an  air  of  abandon  and 
heartiness  which  put  you  entirely  at  your 
ease  with  them.  In  fact,  when  they  asked 
me  to  stand  them  a  drink,  I  very  nearly 


196  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

did  so;  but  not  quite.  Instead,  I  left  them 
abruptly  and  vanished  into  the  night, 
followed  by  epithets  humorous  in  their 
way,  but  not  intended  for  publication. 

To  return  to  Brightwin:  in  due  course 
he  took  me  to  see  Mr.  Bulger,  editor  of 
Thespis,  and  I  found  myself  confronted 
with  a  type  of  the  poet  mind.  !Mr.  Bulger 
was  evidently  a  dreamer.  His  great  am- 
bition centred  upon  a  State  theatre  for 
England,  similar  to  that  in  foreign  coun- 
tries. He  had  very  exalted  opinions  and 
an  intense  hatred  of  bad  Art.  He  wanted 
to  gather  round  him  a  band  of  young  en- 
thusiasts who  would  work  for  love;  be- 
cause, as  he  explained  to  me,  the  pioneer 
is  seldom  rewarded,  excepting  with  the 
laurels  of  fame. 

"  Even  these,"  said  ]Mr.  Bulger  bitterly, 
"  seldom  encircle  his  own  brow.  You  will 
generally  find  them  on  the  bronze  or  mar- 
ble forehead  of  his  statue,  long  after  he 
has  vanished  into  the  dust." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  197 

In  this  high  strain  he  talked,  and  I  saw 
in  a  moment  that  I  stood  before  genius. 
His  soul  looked  out  of  his  eyes  and  made 
them  water.  His  physical  frame  was  of 
no  consequence,  and  one  forgot  it  when  he 
talked.  I  trembled  to  tliink  that  this  as- 
piring man  was  going  to  read  my  poem; 
but  he  did  so,  and  Bright^vin  and  I  sat 
silent  and  watched  him.  Once  or  twice  he 
nodded  in  a  slightly  approving  way;  and 
once  or  twice  he  shook  his  head,  and  I  felt 
the  blush  of  shame  upon  my  cheek. 

When  he  had  finished,  he  said: 

"Quite  excellent,  Mr.  Corkej^;  we  must 
publish  this  in  the  paper.  There  are,  how- 
ever, some  failures  of  technique  and  a  few 
flashes  of  unconscious  humour  that  will  be 
better  away.  jNIay  I  take  it  that  you  will 
not  mind  if  I  edit  the  poem  for  publica- 
tion?" 

Little  knowing  what  this  exactly  meant, 
I  replied  that  it  would  be  a  great  privilege 
to  me  if  he  would  do  so. 


198  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"  Good,"  he  said,  and  put  mj"  poem 
under  a  x^aper-weight  upon  his  desk. 

We  then  discussed  the  drama,  and  he 
told  us  exactly  what  the  young  actor 
should  think  and  feel  about  his  profession. 
It  was  clear  that  I  had  not  thought  and 
felt  at  all  rightly  on  the  subject  of  the 
stage,  for  I  had  rather  intended  to  shine, 
and  be  somebody,  and  play  the  tragic 
lead,  and  so  on.  But  INIr.  Bulger  was 
all  for  quite  a  different  spirit.  He  wor- 
shipped at  the  shrine  of  Art,  and  explained 
that  in  the  service  of  Art  we  must  re- 
gard the  world  and  ourselves  as  well 
lost. 

He  advised  a  spirit  of  self-sacrifice,  and 
admitted  it  was  not  so  much  the  ruling 
principle  in  the  histrionic  mind  as  it  should 
be.  He  said  some  hard  things  about  actor- 
managers,  and  declared  that  in  some  cases 
the  charwomen  who  cleaned  their  theatres 
were  doing  more  for  Art  than  they  were. 
His  eyes  blazed  against  actor-managers  in 


OF  SEVENTEEN  199 

general,  and  they  must  tremble  when  they 
hear  his  name. 

Presently  we  rose  to  take  our  leave, 
and  then,  diving  among  a  mass  of  tickets 
and  documents,  he  produced  a  card  of 
admittance  to  the  Clapham  Assembly  Room 
on  the  occasion  of  an  amateur  theatrical 
entertainment  a  fortnight  hence. 

"  You  can  try  your  hand  at  that,  Mr. 
Corkey,"  he  said  to  me.  "  You  may,  in 
fact,  criticise  the  show  for  our  columns. 
Keep  it  short,  and  don't  indulge  in  pleas- 
antries at  the  expense  of  the  company. 
The  Macready  Dramatic  Club  of  Clapham 
is  a  well-meaning  body  and  their  produc- 
tions are  most  painstaking.  Let  me  have 
an  account  of  your  expenses,  as  I  shall 
defray  them  according  to  my  rule." 

This  was,  naturally,  a  verj'^  great  mo- 
ment for  me.  I  had  but  one  fleeting 
twinge  that  perhaps  it  was  rather  rough 
on  the  Macready  Dramatic  Club  of  Clap- 
ham; but  I  thanked  Mr.  Bulger  heartily 


200  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

for  placing  such  confidence  in  me,  and 
promised  that  I  would  devote  the  whole  of 
my  energies  and  experience  to  the  per- 
formance. 

Not  until  Brightwin  and  I  had  left  the 
editorial  presence  did  I  begin  seriously  to 
doubt;  but  he  assured  me  that  it  was  quite 
unnecessary. 

"  My  dear  chap,"  he  said,  "  you  spend 
all  your  spare  time  at  the  theatre;  you 
are  studying  for  the  stage,  and  you  have 
an  immense  natural  aptitude  for  the  art; 
therefore,  if  you  are  not  good  enough 
to  review  the  efforts  of  a  purely  amateur 
crowd  of  this  sort,  you  ought  to  be." 

So  I  imitated  Brightwin's  slightly  scorn- 
ful view  of  the  Macreadies  of  Clapham, 
and  felt  that,  if  I  could  keej)  up  this 
haughty  spirit  through  the  actual  per- 
formance, all  might  possibly  be  well. 


XI 


I  WAS   now   quite   one   of   the   busiest 
men   in   London.     Every   moment   of 
my  time  was  occupied,  and  I  felt  it  a 
bore  to  have  to  go  to  bed  at  all  and  waste 
precious  hours  in  the  arms  of  Morpheus. 

First  there  was,  of  course,  the  office; 
then  my  elocution  and  stage-gesture  work 
for  the  drama;  then  running  at  the  L.A. 
C. ;  then  cricket  matches  on  Saturday  af- 
ternoons, which  were  very  refreshing  to 
me,  especially  as  I  was  doing  fairly  well 
in  them;  then  literature,  in  the  shape  of  an 
order  from  Mr.  Bulger  to  go  and  criticise 
the  amateurs  of  Clapham;  and  lastly  an 
idea  for  another  poem  —  but  not  about  the 
grey-eyed  girl.  One  lived  in  a  regular 
maelstrom,  if  the  word  may  be  pardoned; 
and,  as  though  all  this  were  not  enough, 
Mr.  Westonshaugh  suddenly  sent  for  me 


202  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

and  told  me  that  I  must  appear  on  the  fol- 
lowing Monday  morning  at  the  West-End 
Branch  of  the  Apollo! 

"  I  have  selected  you,  Mr.  Corkey,"  he 
said,  "  to  help  our  branch  during  the  usual 
quarterly  rush  of  work.  At  these  times 
the  branch  stands  in  need  of  assistance, 
and  the  experience  will  be  very  desirable. 
Be  at  No.  7  Trafalgar  Square,  sharp  at 
ten  o'clock  on  Monday  next,  and  let  me 
hear  my  confidence  is  not  displaced." 

On  telling  Mr.  Blades  of  this  event, 
he  said  that  it  was  an  excellent  thing  for 
me,  and  w^ould  introduce  me  to  some  of 
the  leaders  in  the  Apollo  Fire  Office. 

"  You  will  be  in  the  hands  of  Mr. 
Bright  and  ^Ir.  Walter,"  he  said,  "  and 
they  are  two  of  the  most  original  and  de- 
lightful men  in  London.  I  have  the  plea- 
sure of  knowing  them  i)ersonally,  and  you 
can  tell  them  that  you  are  a  friend  of 
mine,  which  will  interest  them  in  you." 

I  thanked  JNlr.   Blades  for  this  further 


OF  SEVENTEEN  203 

example  of  his  unwavering  kindness  to  me, 
and  he  gave  me  a  brief  description  of  the 
men  who  were  to  command  my  services  in 
the  West  End  of  London. 

"  Bright  is  the  best  all-round  man  in  the 
A.F.O.,"  said  Mr.  Blades,  meaning,  of 
course,  the  Apollo  Fire  Office.  "  He  is  a 
good  sportsman,  and  was  also  a  volunteer 
in  his  time.  He  is  the  champion  of  the 
office  at  billiards,  and  in  his  leisure  he  is 
a  County  Councilor  and  a  keen  politician. 
There  are  great  stories  told  about  him  in 
his  earlier  days  in  the  City.  He  was  a 
dare-devil  man  then  and  took  frightful 
risks.  I  don't  mean  insurance  risks,"  added 
Mr.  Blades,  "  but  sporting  risks,  involving 
danger  to  life  and  limb.  For  a  wager  he 
once  walked  round  that  narrow  ledge  that 
surrounds  the  top  of  the  gallery  outside 
this  department.  You  know  the  place. 
One  false  step  would  have  dashed  him  to 
instant  death ;  but  he  did  n't  care.  He 
did  n't  make  the  false  step.    It  is  a  record. 


204  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

We  have  n't  got  any  chaps  Hke  that 
now." 

I  instantly  went  out  to  look  at  the  ledge 
mentioned  by  Mr.  Blades,  and  the  sight 
of  it  impressed  me  enormously.  You 
would  have  thought  a  bird  would  have 
hesitated  to  walk  along  it. 

"  He  must  be  a  great  man,"  I  said, 
"  and  have  a  nerve  of  iron." 

"  He  has,"  assented  Mr.  Blades.  "  And 
he  has  a  wide  grip  of  politics,  too;  he  is 
a  keen  debater  and  will  set  some  of  your 
ideas  right  on  many  subjects.  He  under- 
stands capital  and  labour  and  such  like; 
which  you  do  not." 

I  admitted  this,  and  then  asked  about 
the  remarkable  points  of  Mr.  Walter. 

"  Walter  is  a  ray  of  sunshine,"  an- 
swered JNIr.  Blades.  "  He  has  a  nature 
none  can  resist,  and  is  the  most  popular 
man  in  the  office.  He  is  a  most  humorous 
man  and  will  make  you  die  of  laughing. 
He  has  two  brothers  on  the  professional 


OF  SEVENTEEN  205 

stage,  and  he  is  for  all  practical  purposes 
a  professional  actor  himself;  but  he  thinks 
two  brothers  on  the  regular  stage  are 
enough.  He  plays  parts  in  public,  how- 
ever, and  is  a  comedian  who  has  nothing 
left  to  learn.  If  he  chokes  you  off  this 
nonsense  about  the  stage,  it  will  be  a  good 
thing  done." 

I  could  hardly  believe  my  ears,  for  Mr. 
Blades  described  just  such  a  man  as  I 
hungered  to  know.  Whether  he  would  be 
interested  in  an  utter  beginner  was,  of 
course,  only  too  doubtful;  but,  as  Mr. 
Blades  said  that  he  was  like  a  ray  of  sun- 
shine, I  hoped  with  a  great  hope  that  he 
would  shine  on  me  a  little  if  he  had  time. 

My  impatience  for  Monday  to  come  was 
so  extreme  that  during  Sunday  I  took  the 
opportunity  to  go  down  to  Trafalgar 
Square  and  look  at  the  outside  of  our 
West-End  Branch.  Trafalgar  Square  is 
naturally  too  well  known  to  need  any 
lengthened    description    from    me;    but    I 


206  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

may  mention  that  the  National  Gallery 
stands  on  one  side,  and  our  West-End 
Branch  on  the  other,  with  Nelson's  Monu- 
ment between  them.  Nothing  else  really 
matters. 

Our  premises  were  stately  without  osten- 
tation, and  richly  but  not  gaudily  deco- 
rated. The  entrance  was  hidden  under  a 
shutter  of  iron,  and  the  windows  were  also 
concealed  in  the  same  manner.  The  build- 
ing ascended  to  some  rather  striking  archi- 
tectural details  at  the  top  and  was,  upon 
the  whole,  an  imposing  pile,  though  with- 
out the  gloomy  grandeur  of  the  Head  Of- 
fice in  Threadneedle  Street,  E.G. 

Punctually  to  time,  I  arrived  on  the 
following  morning,  and  was  greeted  with 
the  utmost  friendliness.  The  JNIanager  of 
this  most  important  Branch  was  called 
Mr.  Harrison,  and  1  consider  that  he  was 
the  most  dignified  man  I  had  yet  beheld 
in  the  flesh.  For  pure  dignity  it  would 
have  been  difficult  to  find  his  equal.     He 


OF  SEVENTEEN  207 

said  little,  but  pursued  the  even  tenor  of 
his  way  and  controlled  the  great  business 
of  the  Branch  with  a  skill  begot  of  long 
practice.  He  was  slightly  bald,  very  hand- 
some, and  very  thoughtful.  His  thoughts 
were,  of  course,  hidden  from  the  staff,  as 
a  rule,  but  he  was  a  most  popular  Chief, 
and  everybody  took  a  pride  in  doing  what 
he  wished  with  the  utmost  possible  celerity. 
He  did  not  rule  by  fear;  but  by  his  great 
dignity  and  aristocratic  manner.  He  was 
never  flustered,  never  excited  and  never 
annoyed;  and  this  fine  manner,  of  course, 
left  its  mark  on  the  whole  of  the  West- 
End  Branch.  In  fact,  I  found  there  was 
a  different  atmosphere  here,  and  the  staff 
looked  at  life  from  rather  a  new  point  of 
view.  I  felt  my  mind  broadening  from  the 
moment  I  arrived.  The  men  all  had  such 
wide  ideas.  This,  no  doubt,  was  owing  to 
the  proximity  of  Buckingham  Palace  to 
some  extent;  also  the  Houses  of  Parlia- 
ment and  the  National  Gallery.    It  is  true 


208  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

that  I  was  next  door  to  the  Bank  of  Eng- 
land in  the  Citj^  and  that,  in  its  way,  en- 
larges the  mind  on  financial  subjects;  but 
to  be  in  a  place  where  Queen  Victoria 
might  drive  past  the  window  at  any  mo- 
ment, and  yet  leave  the  staff  i)erfectly  cool 
and  collected,  was  very  impressive.  In 
fact,  there  was  an  element  of  awe. 

Mr.  Bright  proved  to  be  my  personal 
Chief,  and  indicated  my  work  with  affa- 
bility combined  with  speed.  He  was  a 
very  masculine  man,  with  blue  eyes  of 
extraordinary  brightness,  and  a  genial 
manner  of  tolerant  amusement  at  life  in 
general,  that  doubtless  concealed  immense 
experience  of  it.  He  was  fair  and  athletic, 
and  had  a  most  unusual  way  of  coming  to 
the  heart  of  a  matter  and  not  wasting 
words.  He  feared  nothing,  and  his  knowl- 
edge of  his  official  duties  was,  of  course, 
supreme.     But  he  carried  it  lightly. 

I  had  never  seen  the  great  British  pub- 
lic coming  in  to  insure  its  goods  and  chat- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  209 

tels  before;  but  they  continually  poured 
in  at  our  West-End  Branch;  and  to  see 
Mr.  Bright  and  Mr.  Bewes  and  Mr.  Wal- 
ter stand  at  the  counters  of  the  office  and 
deal  with  the  fearful  complexities  of  the 
highest  insurance  problems  was  a  great  ex- 
perience for  me. 

Mr.  Walter  was  even  more  wonderful 
than  Mr.  Blades  said  he  would  be.  His 
knowledge  ranged  over  every  branch  of 
Art,  and  he  was  just  as  much  at  home  in 
a  Surrey-side  theatre,  laughing  at  a  melo- 
drama, as  he  was  in  the  National  Gallery 
among  masterpieces  of  painting,  or  at  St. 
James'  Hall  listening  to  the  thunderous 
intricacies  of  Wagnerian  music.  He  un- 
derstood nearly  as  much  as  Mr.  Merridew 
about  the  stage,  and  was  himself  an  accom- 
plished histrion,  well  known  to  many  pro- 
fessional actors.  At  Trafalgar  Square 
there  are,  of  course,  great  natural  facilities 
for  approaching  the  Strand;  and  Mr.  Wal- 
ter had  availed  himself  of  them,   with   a 


210  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

result  that  he  knew  the  haunts  of  the  sock 
and  buskin  as  few  knew  them. 

In  person  he  was  of  medium  stature, 
with  an  eye  wherein  Momus  had  made  his 
home.  He  extracted  humour  from  every- 
thing, and  his  facial  command  was  such 
that  while  his  audience  might  be  convulsed 
with  merriment,  not  a  muscle  moved. 
Occasionally  he  and  Mr.  Bright  would  in- 
dulge in  a  war  of  wit  across  the  floor  of  the 
house,  as  they  say;  and  on  these  occasions 
it  was  utterly  impossible  for  me  to  pursue 
mj^  avocation  of  registering  policies. 

Of  Mr.  Bewes  I  need  only  say  that  he 
was  a  silent  and  an  obviously  brainy  man. 
He  had  a  short  black  beard,  a  penetrating 
glance  from  behind  his  spectacles,  and  was 
a  Roman  Catholic.  Of  this  important  but 
secretive  man  I  can  mention  one  highly 
interesting  fact.  He  never  went  out  of 
doors  for  lunch,  but  descended  to  a  lower 
chamber,  where  one  might  have  a  chop  or 
steak,  cooked  by  the  Senior  Messenger  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  211 

the  West-End  Branch.  Mr.  Bewes  always 
had  a  chop,  except  on  Friday,  when,  being 
a  staunch  Catholic,  he  denied  himself  this 
trifling  pleasure.  But  the  extraordinary 
thing  was  that  he  never  varied  his  lunch, 
or  branched  off  in  the  direction  of  a  steak 
or  sausage.  Thus  he  ate  five  chops  every 
week,  year  after  year,  excepting  when 
away  for  his  holidays,  when,  of  course,  the 
staff  did  not  know  what  he  ate.  For  fifty 
weeks  in  the  year  he  persisted  in  this 
course,  with  a  result  that  the  simplest  sta- 
tistics will  show  he  ate  two  hundred  and 
fifty  chops  per  annum.  A  further  calcu- 
lation was  also  possible,  which  produced 
even  more  remarkable  results,  for  it  trans- 
pired that  Mr.  Bewes  had  been  in  the 
Apollo  Fire  Office  for  forty-eight  j^ears, 
and  had  persisted  in  his  regular  habits 
within  the  memory  of  man.  Therefore,  it 
followed  that  during  his  official  career  he 
had  devoured  no  less  than  twelve  thousand 
chops!    One  might  work  this  out  in  sheep. 


212  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

and  doubtless  find  that  Mr.  Bewes  had  con- 
sumed a  very  considerable  flock  in  his 
time.  His  health  was  good,  and  his  mem- 
ory unimpaired;  but  he  was  now  nearly 
seventy  years  of  age,  and  proposed  retir- 
ing on  a  pension  fairly  soon. 

It  gave  one  a  good  idea  of  the  age  and 
solidity  of  the  Apollo,  when  one  heard  of 
a  life  like  this  devoted  to  its  service.  In 
fact,  in  the  words  of  the  poet,  it  can  truly 
be  said  that  "  men  may  come  and  men 
may  go;  but  the  Apollo  goes  on  for- 
ever." 

It  would  be  impossible  to  describe  how 
Mr.  Bright  and  JNIr.  Walter  enlarged  my 
mind.  They  did  not  do  it  on  purpose,  or 
in  an  improving  manner,  but  they  just 
showed  me,  in  casual  conversation,  their 
knowledge  of  life  and  its  realities  and  the 
things  that  matter  and  the  things  that  do 
not.  And  over  it  all  was  cast  a  mantle  of 
easy  tolerance  and  patience  with  the  fools 
who  came  to  insure,  and   the   idiots   who 


OF  SEVENTEEN  213 

did  n't  understand  the  very  rudiments  of 
the  science,  and  the  occasional  shady  cus- 
tomers, who  gave  wrong  change  and  pre- 
tended they  had  made  a  mistake,  and  so  on. 
It  was  the  hand  of  steel  in  the  velvet  glove 
with  Mr.  Bright.  I  should  think  he  must 
have  been  the  hardest  man  to  score  off  in 
the  entire  Apollo.  His  repartee  was  of 
the  deadliest  sort,  and,  on  principle,  he 
never  allowed  himself  to  be  worsted  in 
argument.  You  might  have  described  his 
line  of  action  as  a  combination  of  the 
suaviter  in  modo  with  the  fortiter  in  re; 
while  Mr.  Walter  trusted  almost  entirely 
to  the  suaviter  style,  combined,  of  course, 
with  a  sense  of  the  ludicrous  which  con- 
stantly enabled  him  to  see  funny  things 
that  nobody  else  saw.  He  was  a  mine  of 
rich  and  rare  quotations  from  the  drama- 
tists, and  would  apply  these  with  an  apti- 
tude little  short  of  miraculous.  He  would 
make  puns  at  a  moment's  provocation,  and 
his  draughtsmanship,  in  the  impressionistic 


214  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

style,  was  such  that  he  would  make  a  light- 
ning sketch  of  a  man  to  his  very  face,  while 
engaged  in  insuring  his  household  goods. 
Occasionally  Mr.  Harrison  felt  called  upon 
to  check  the  universal  hilarity;  but  he  al- 
ways did  it  with  reluctance,  for  he  also 
had  a  keen  sense  of  humour,  especially  for 
jokes  involving  the  Irish  dialect. 

Into  this  cheerful  and  exhilarating  hive 
of  industry  I  came,  to  find  everybody  most 
kindly  disposed  towards  me.  The  work 
was,  of  course,  hard;  but  it  was  lightened 
by  occasional  gleams  of  Mr.  Bright  or 
Mr.  Walter;  while  another  most  excellent 
and  genial  man  also  came  and  went.  He 
flitted  in  and  out  mysteriously,  and  proved 
to  be  called  Mr.  Macdonald.  He  was, 
therefore,  of  Scottish  origin,  and  his  work 
concerned  the  mysteries  of  Life  Insurance. 
The  science  is  even  more  abstruse  than 
Fire  Insurance,  and  needs  what  is  known 
as  the  actuarial  instinct.  This  must  be 
rare,   for   I  heard  Mr.   Bright   declare  to 


OF  SEVENTEEN  215 

Mr.  Macdonald  that  the  great  actuary 
is  born,  not  made.  Then  there  were  also 
surveyors  —  men  of  special  knowledge  — 
who  also  came  and  went,  and  other  junior 
clerks,  who  were  rather  more  austere  to 
me  than  the  senior  ones. 

It  was  here,  on  the  third  day  of  my  visit, 
that  Mr.  Bright  kindly  corrected  my  views 
with  regard  to  demand  and  supply  and 
other  pressing  questions  of  the  day. 

In  politics  I  was  a  Conservative,  but 
only  by  birth,  and  only  up  to  the  time  of 
going  to  the  West-End  Branch  of  the 
Apollo.  Then,  under  the  greater  knowl- 
edge and  more  philosophical  intelligence  of 
Mr.  Bright,  I  began  to  calm  down.  It 
happened  over  a  matter  of  a  tailor.  My 
Aunt  Augusta,  womanlike,  attached  im- 
portance to  my  clothes,  and  now  directed 
me  to  buy  a  new  suit.  Mr.  Walter  was 
good  enough  to  tell  me  of  his  tailor,  who 
was  a  man  of  temperate  views  in  the  mat- 
ter of  cost,  and  I  went  to  him.    It  was  not 


216  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

far  to  go,  as  his  emporium  happened  to  be 
next  door  to  the  Apollo. 

Well,  this  man  was  distinctly  haughty. 
He  was  a  large,  amply-made  man  with  a 
yellowish  beard  and  full  eye;  and  he  looked 
down  the  sides  of  his  nose  like  a  camel.  I 
told  him  that  I  had  come  to  be  measured 
for  a  suit  of  clothes,  and  he  showed  no 
interest  whatever,  but  merely  beckoned  a 
lesser  man  and  left  me  with  him.  Presently 
he  strolled  back,  while  I  was  being  meas- 
ured ;  and  when,  to  show  the  gulf  there  must 
always  be  fixed,  as  I  thought,  between  the 
customer  and  the  tradesman,  I  hoped  his 
business  was  prosperous  and  offered  to  let 
him  have  a  pound  or  two  in  advance.  At  this 
he  appeared  amused,  and  asked  me  if  I 
was  one  of  those  American  millionaires  in 
disguise.  In  fact,  he  was  not  content  with 
putting  himself  on  my  level,  but  rather 
clearly  indicated  that  he  thought  himself 
above  it.  This  view  from  a  tailor  had  all 
the  charm  of  novelty  to  me;  but  I  felt 


OF  SEVENTEEN  217 

myself  grow  rather  hot,  and  in  my  annoy- 
ance I  tried  a  repartee  in  the  style  of  Mr. 
Bright. 

*'  Is  it  true  that  it  takes  nine  tailors  to 
make  a  man? "  I  said. 

"  It  depends,"  he  answered.  "  I  expect 
it  would  take  nine  men  like  you  to  make 
a  tailor." 

Now,  even  to  a  tyro  in  repartee,  it  was 
of  course  apj^arent  that  I  had  got  the 
worst  of  this.  There  ought  to  have  been 
something  further  to  add  on  my  side;  but 
my  admiration  at  such  a  brilliant  flash  of 
badinage  was  such  that  I  could  only  laugh 
with  the  greatest  heartiness.  I  was,  how- 
ever, merely  laughing  at  the  humour,  not  at 
the  beast  of  a  tailor;  and  when  I  had  re- 
covered from  my  amusement,  I  told  him  so. 

I  said:  "  That's  jolly  good;  but,  at  the 
same  time,  you  ought  n't  to  talk  to  new 
customers  in  this  withering  way.  You 
don't  know  who  I  am.  I  may  be  the  son 
of  a  duke,  and  worth  very  likely  ten  or 


218  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

fifteen  pounds  a  year  to  you  for  the  rest 
of   your   life." 

It  then  transpired  that  he  had  seen  me 
in  the  office,  when  he  went  to  pay  his  own 
fire  insurance  a  few  days  before. 

*'  You  have  a  yarn  with  Mr.  Bright 
and  Mr.  Walter,"  he  said.  "  They  '11  tell 
you  a  thing  or  two  well  worth  your  know- 
ing." 

I  fell  in  with  this  suggestion  and  sub- 
mitted the  case  to  Mr.  Bright,  who  spoke 
in  the  following  manner: 

"  To  put  on  side,  because  you  think  j^ou 
are  more  important  than  that  tailor,  is 
absolute  footle,  my  dear  Corkey,"  he  de- 
clared. "  That  tailor,  if  you  '11  excuse  me 
for  saying  so,  is  worth  forty  thousand  of 
you.  He's  richer;  he's  wiser;  he's 
smarter ;  he 's  worked  harder ;  he  knows 
more ;  he  's  traveled  farther ;  he  's  better- 
looking;  in  fact,  he  can  give  you  yards  and 
a  beating  in  every  possible  direction;  so 
why  the  deuce  do  you  think  yourself,  in 


OF  SEVENTEEN  219 

some  mysterious  way,  the  better  man? 
Where  do  you  reckon  you're  better?" 

"  Well,"  I  said,  "  my  father  was  a  sol- 
dier and  died  for  his  country." 

"That's  all  right,"  said  Mr.  Bright. 
"  Your  father  was  a  hero,  no  doubt,  and 
any  properly  minded  person  would  have 
treated  him  as  such.  But  you  're  not. 
You  have  n't  died  for  your  country,  by  the 
look  of  you,  and  have  n't  the  smallest  in- 
tention of  doing  so.  My  grandfather  was 
a  bishop;  but  I  don't  expect  people  to  ask 
for  my  blessing  on  the  strength  of  it. 
There  's  only  one  exception  to  the  rule  that 
one  man's  as  good  as  another,  my  dear 
Corkey  —  only  one  exception" 

"  And  what  is  that?  "  I  asked. 

"  The  only  exception  is  —  when  he  's  a 
jolly  sight  better!"  answered  Mr.  Bright. 
"  You  must  judge  of  a  man  by  himself,  not 
by  the  accidents  of  birth  or  cash.  The 
tailor  next  door  has  won  his  place  in  the 
world  by  hard  work  and  sense  and  brains; 


220  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

therefore  he  has  a  perfect  right  to  reserve 
his  judgment,  so  far  as  you  are  concerned, 
until  he  sees  what  you  are  good  for.  And, 
seeing  that  he  's  got  probably  a  thousand 
pounds  to  every  one  of  your  shillings,  the 
spectacle  of  you  advancing  a  quid  on  your 
clothes  —  to  keep  him  going  —  naturally 
amused  him." 

This  was  my  first  introduction  to  po- 
litical economy  and  the  rights  of  man,  so 
naturally  I  found  it  exceedingly  interest- 
ing. In  fact,  so  much  did  the  force  of 
Mr.  Bright's  arguments  impress  me  that, 
in  a  week,  I  was  an  advanced  Socialist, 
and  going  too  far  altogether  in  the  op- 
posite   direction. 

But  now  an  exciting  event  claims  my 
attention;  for  at  the  West-End  Branch 
a  fresh  duty  devolved  upon  me,  and  I  had 
to  attend  upon  the  Directors  of  the  Com- 
pany, when  they  dropped  in  from  time  to 
time  to  put  their  signatures  to  the  new 
policies.     Every  policy  had  the  signature 


OF  SEVENTEEN  221 

of  two  Directors  upon  it,  otherwise  it  was 
not  a  complete  legal  document;  so  the 
great  men  came  occasionally,  and  I  had 
to  stand  beside  them,  blotting-paper  in 
hand,  and  blot  their  names  as  they  wrote 
them,  and  draw  away  each  policy  in  turn 
as  it  was  signed. 

Judge  of  my  great  pleasure  when  who 
should  arrive  one  morning  to  put  his  sig- 
nature to  policies  but  my  old  friend,  Mr. 
Pepys!  I  carried  in  a  hundred  policies 
for  his  attention,  and  beamed  upon  him 
with  the  utmost  heartiness;  but  only  to 
be  met  by  a  look  of  polite,  but  complete, 
unrecognition!  It  was,  as  it  were,  a 
further  illustration  of  the  great  gulf  be- 
tween capital  and  labour  —  Mr.  Pepys,  of 
course,  standing  for  the  former  commodity. 
But,  though  he  did  not  associate  me  with 
his  past,  Mr.  Pepys  was  exceedingly  polite. 
He  adopted  the  genial  manner  of  a  man 
who  falls  in  with  a  strange  but  friendly 
dog,  and  encourages  it. 


222  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

After  signing  twenty  policies,  he  tired 
and  sighed  and  had  to  rest.  Then,  being 
the  kindliest  of  men,  he  addressed  a  few 
words  to  me  on  an  official  subject. 

"  Had  any  fires  lately?  "  he  asked. 

But  I  did  n't  know  in  the  least,  as  fires, 
of  course,  belonged  to  one  of  the  highest 
branches  of  the  subject.  I  chanced  it, 
however,  and  said: 

"  Nothing  of  much  consequence,  sir." 

"  Good ! "  he  answered.  Then  he  was 
seized  with  a  sudden  fit  of  caution. 

"  But  you  keep  an  account  of  them, 
don't  you?"  he  asked,  almost  anxiously. 

This  afforded  me  the  extraordinary  ex- 
perience of  finding  a  man  who  knew  less 
about  fire  insurance  than  I  did;  and  I  re- 
membered how,  in  the  far  past,  months 
ago,  Mr.  Pepys  had  spoken  slightingly  of 
his  knowledge  of  the  business.  I  felt 
quite  an  old,  trusty  official  after  this  — 
one  of  the  faithful,  dogged  sort  of  men 
who  are  actuated  solely  by  enthusiasm  for 


OF  SEVENTEEN  223 

their  masters'  interests.  I  slightly  patron- 
ised Mr.  Pepys,  but  not  intentionally.  I 
said: 

"Oh  yes,  sir;  we  don't  allow  them  to 
pass." 

"  That 's  right!  "  he  replied,  and  showed 
a  satisfaction  which  may  or  may  not  have 
been  genuine. 

"  They  are  all  embalmed  in  the  archives 
of  the  Society,  sir,"  I  added. 

He  looked  at  me  doubtfully  after  this, 
and  did  n't  seem  to  be  sure  of  his  ground. 
At  any  rate,  it  silenced  him;  to  my  dis- 
appointment he  made  no  further  remarks 
about  fire  insurance  or  anything  else,  but 
took  up  his  pen  again,  sighed,  and  signed 
a  few  more  policies.  At  this  moment  an- 
other director  entered,  and  Mr.  Pepys 
wished  him  good  morning,  and  he  said, 
"Morning!" 

He  was  a  very  different  type  of  Capital. 
He  was,  in  fact,  a  retired  general  officer 
of   some   repute   in   his   time,   which   was. 


224  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

however,  long  past.  He  had  recently  been 
made  a  peer,  and  from  being  called  Lamb 
had  soared  into  a  title  and  taken  the  name 
of  some  place  that  interested  him  in  Scot- 
land. I  doubt,  when  selecting  his  title, 
whether  he  had  remembered  the  policies  of 
the  Apollo;  for  while  "Lamb"  is  a  word 
you  can  dash  off  in  a  second,  "  Cor- 
rievairacktown "  is  not.  He  laboured 
frightfully  at  it  and  heaved  like  a  ship  at 
sea,  and  sometimes  actually  forgot  how  to 
spell  it!  He  jerked  his  snow-white  head 
abruptly,  as  though  he  had  acquired  the 
habit  of  dodging  cannon-balls,  and  from 
time  to  time  he  gave  off  little  sharp  explo- 
sions of  breath,  like  a  cat  when  trodden 
upon.  This  man  realised  his  own  greatness 
in  a  way  that  perhaps  nobody  else  did.  He 
was  a  Conservative  to  his  soldierly  back- 
bone, and  I  think  sometimes,  when  he  came 
to  the  Apollo  for  the  tame  occupation  of 
signing  policies,  he  was  almost  ashamed 
that  a  man,  who  had  seen  many  a  shot  fired 


OF  SEVENTEEN  225 

in  anger  and  moved  like  an  avenging  spirit 
under  the  hurtling  wings  of  the  God  of 
War,  should  have  come  down  to  signing 
policies  for  such  homely  things  as  —  cook- 
ing utensils,  and  so  on. 

To  illustrate  the  nerve  and  courage  of 
Mr.  Bright  at  a  supreme  crisis,  I  may  tell 
you  that  in  his  younger  days  he  had  once 
been  attending  to  General  Sir  Hastings 
Lamb,  as  he  was  then,  and  during  an  ex- 
plosion on  the  part  of  the  gallant  warrior 
he  hurled  fifty  or  sixty  policies  in  a  heap 
to  the  ground.  Doubtless,  he  expected 
Mr.  Bright  to  bound  forward  and  pick 
them  up  again;  but  far  from  it! 

Mr.  Bright,  well  versed  in  Capital  and 
Labour  and  Political  Economy  and  the 
Rights  of  Man,  knew  that  he  was  not 
there  to  pick  policies  off  the  floor  which  an 
irritated  representative  of  Capital  had 
thrown  upon  it.  He  knew  the  machinery 
of  the  office  provided  that,  in  such  a  con- 
tingency, he  must  ring  the  Board  Room 


226  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

bell  and  summon  a  messenger,  for  the  sub- 
ordinate task  of  putting  the  policies  on  the 
table  again.  Accordingly,  he  summoned  a 
messenger  and  directed  him  how  to  pro- 
ceed. Whereupon,  the  rei)resentative  of 
Capital  subsided  instantly  and  signed  the 
rest  of  the  policies  like  the  lamb  he  was  in 
those  days.  Undoubtedly  you  might  call 
this  a  triumph  for  the  sacred  rights  of  man ; 
and  it  also  showed  that  Mr.  Bright's  moral 
courage  was  equal  to  his  physical,  which 
is  saying  a  great  deal. 


XII 

"X^  TITH  an  auspicious  and  a  drop- 
\/ Y  ping  eye,"  as  Shakespeare  says, 
I  returned  in  due  course  to  the 
Parent  Office  of  the  Apollo.  I  was  glad 
to  go  back  to  Mr.  Blades  and  Travers  and 
other  friends;  but  I  was  exceedingly  sorry 
to  leave  Mr.  Walter  and  Mr.  Bright.  In 
fact,  I  missed  them  a  great  deal,  and  wrote 
to  them  once  or  twice;  and  they  answered 
without  hesitation,  and  hoped  to  see  me 
again  at  some  future  time. 

And  now  I  was  faced  with  my  first 
great  critical  task  for  Mr.  Bulger,  and 
secretly  I  viewed  it  with  great  nervousness, 
though  openly  to  Brightwin  I  approached 
the  test  in  a  jaunty  spirit.  Needless  to 
say  I  had  taken  preliminary  steps,  and 
the  greatest  of  these  was  to  hire  a  dress 
suit.     At  this  stage  in  my  career,  unfor- 


228  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Innately,  to  buy  a  dress  suit  presented  in- 
superable difficulties;  but  I  found  from 
fellow-pupils  at  the  Dramatic  School  that 
one  might  hire  for  a  merely  nominal  sum. 
So  I  hired,  and  had  a  dress  rehearsal  of 
the  part  I  was  to  play  at  Clapham  Assem- 
bly Room,  in  which  my  Aunt  Augusta 
and  her  servant,  Jane,  constituted  the 
audience. 

Then  came  the  important  night.  I  re- 
turned home  direct  from  the  office,  par- 
took of  a  slight  repast,  and  reached  the 
Clapham  Assembly  Room  three-quarters 
of  an  hour  before  the  doors  opened.  This 
was  rather  feeble  in  a  way,  and  not  worthy 
of  Mr.  Bulger,  or  Thespis,  because  we  all 
know  that  professional  critics  dash  up  at 
the  last  moment  in  their  private  broughams 
and  sink  into  a  sumptuous  stall  just  as  the 
curtain  rises  on  new  productions.  But  I 
had  come,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  in  a  tram 
and  was  far  too  early.  A  sense  of  pro- 
priety, however,  told  me  that  I  ought  not 


OF  SEVENTEEN  229 

to  be  there  —  skulking  about  at  least  an 
hour  before  I  need  be;  and  so,  with  a  fair 
amount  of  presence  of  mind,  I  started  off 
to  take  a  look  at  Clapham,  which  was  a 
district  quite  unknown  to  me.  I  decided 
with  myself  that  nothing  would  make  me 
return  to  the  Assembly  Room  until  ten 
minutes  before  the  curtain  actually  rose.  I 
should  then  lounge  in,  present  my  ticket, 
and  appear  with  a  bored  and  weary  air 
among  my  fellow-critics. 

But  as  all  roads  were  said  by  the  an- 
cients to  lead  to  Rome,  so  all  roads  at 
Clapham  appear  to  lead  to  the  Assembly 
Room.  I  walked  away  again  and  again 
and  kept  going  in  directions  that  seemed 
to  point  exactly  opposite  from  the  As- 
sembly Room,  yet,  sooner  or  later,  I  in- 
variably found  myself  back  in  the  same 
old  spot.  The  exterior  of  this  edifice  was 
of  an  unattractive  architecture,  and  not 
until  two  minutes  before  the  doors  opened 
did  people  begin  to  collect  in  front  of  it. 


230  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

After  being,  as  it  were,  the  hero  of  a  hun- 
dred first  nights  in  London,  this  audience 
at  Clapham  appeared  piffling;  but  as  the 
performance  was  for  a  charitable  institu- 
tion, many  came  actuated  by  philanthropic 
emotions  and,  of  course,  in  a  perfectly  un- 
critical spirit.  I,  however,  being  there  in 
the  course  of  business,  felt  that  I  must 
not  let  any  considerations  of  the  charitable 
institution  come  between  me  and  my  duty. 

The  moment  arrived,  and  I  entered  and 
presented  my  ticket  with  an  air  of  patient 
and  long-suffering  indifference. 

"Press!"  said  the  man  in  the  ticket- 
office,  and  marked  a  number  on  my  ticket 
and  handed  it  to  another  man.  It  was 
distinctly  a  moment  to  remember,  and  I 
forgot  my  hired  clothes  and  everything, 
but  just  felt  that  I  stood  there  as  a  rep- 
resentative of  that  glorious  institution  — 
the  London  Press! 

]My  seat  was  in  the  second  row  and  com- 
fortable enough,  without  being  sumj^tuous. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  231 

I  had  a  good  view  of  the  stage  and  I  lei- 
surely divested  myself  of  my  overcoat,  saw 
that  my  dress  shirt  and  tie  were  all  right, 
pulled  down  my  cuffs,  and  cast  my  eyes 
round  the  house.  An  amateur  band,  con- 
sisting chiefly  of  ladies,  was  playing,  and  a 
certain  amount  of  verve  and  vivacity, 
though  not  much,  filled  the  auditorium. 
Clapham  had  by  no  means  turned  out  in 
its  thousands;  in  fact,  it  was  quite  easy 
to  count  the  house,  and  I  should  be  ex- 
aggerating if  I  suggested  that  there  were 
more  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  persons 
in  it.  Subtract  fifty  for  biased  friends  of 
the  performers  and  take  off  another  fifty 
for  pure  philanthropists,  and  that  left  not 
more  than  a  hundred  and  fifty  at  the  out- 
side who  could  be  supposed  to  have  come 
in  a  critical  or  artistic  spirit. 

The  critics  did  not  reveal  their  person- 
ality or  sun  themselves  in  the  front  of  the 
stalls,  as  I  had  seen  them  do  in  proper 
theatres  on  a  first  night.     They  may  have 


232  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

been  there  by  stealth  and  in  disguise ;  but 
more  likely  they  had  sent  substitutes. 

An  official  in  evening  dress  came  to 
speak  to  me  presently.  He  evidently  knew 
that  I  wielded  my  pen  for  Thespis,  and  I 
could  see  that  knowledge  inspired  his 
friendship.  He  hoped  I  was  comfortable, 
and  said  that,  after  the  second  act,  there 
would  be  whisky  and  soda  and  sandwiches 
going  in  the  gentlemen's  cloak-room.  He 
added  that  they  had  all  been  in  fear  that 
the  leading  lady  would  lose  her  mother  and 
be  unable  to  act.  But  by  good  chance  her 
mother  was  spared  and  she  was  going  to 
play. 

"  Of  course  we  had  an  understudy,"  ex- 
plained the  official,  who  proved  to  be  the 
assistant  acting  manager;  "but  no  doubt 
you  know,  better  than  I  do,  what  a  bore 
it  is  for  everybody  concerned  to  have  to 
fall  back  upon  the  understiidies." 

"  For  everybody  but  the  understudies," 
I  answered  in  a  knowing  sort  of  way,  and 


OF  SEVENTEEN  233 

the  assistant  acting  manager  said  it  was 
deuced  good,  and  left  me. 

Of  course  the  whisky  and  soda  and 
sandwiches  were  a  bribe,  and  I  decided  not 
to  touch  them,  because  you  could  n't  be  un- 
prejudiced about  people  who  thrust  whisky 
and  soda  upon  you ;  besides,  I  did  n't  drink 
whisky.  Every  critic  worthy  of  the  name 
snatches  a  glass  of  champagne  between  the 
acts  of  a  new  play,  and  then  comes  back 
to  his  seat  licking  the  ends  of  his  mustache; 
but  the  management  does  n't  pay  for  the 
sparkling  beverage  —  far  from  it :  the  critic 
pays  himself  and  so  preserves  his  right  of 
judgment  untarnished. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  after  the  second  act 
I  did  stroll  round  to  see  the  other  critics 
and  hear  if  others  agreed  with  my  views  of 
the  performance.  There  were  four  obvious 
critics  in  the  cloak-room,  all  eating  and 
drinking  with  complete  abandon  and  not 
saying  a  word  about  the  play;  and  there 
were  several  other  people  of  both  sexes  also 


234  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

eating  and  drinking,  who  might,  or  might 
not,  have  been  critics. 

Somehow  I  found  a  plate  of  sardine 
sandwiches  under  my  hand,  so  just  ate 
perhaps  six  or  eight,  without,  however, 
surrendering  my  right  of  judgment.  There 
was  no  sparkling  wine  going,  but  siphons 
of  soda-water  and  two  bottles  of  whisky. 
I  drank  about  a  pennyworth  of  pure  soda- 
water,  smoked  half  a  cigarette,  and  then 
returned  to  the  auditorium.  No  official 
spoke  a  word  to  me  during  this  interlude. 
They  may  have  felt  it  was  better  taste 
not  to. 

The  play  which  was  submitted  to  my 
attention  was  not  in  any  literary  sense  a 
novelty,  though  there  were  several  new 
readings  in  it,  of  which  the  least  said  the 
soonest  mended,  in  my  opinion.  The 
drama  in  question  was  adapted  from  the 
French  of  that  famous  dramatist,  M.  Vic- 
torien  Sardou,  and  it  had  taken  two  Eng- 
lishmen to  do  it,  both  called  Rowe,  namely, 


OF  SEVENTEEN  235 

Mr.  Saville  Rowe  and  Mr.  Bolton  Rowe. 
Diplomacy  was  the  English  name  of  the 
famous  play,  and  there  were  seven  men  in 
it  and  five  women.  I  knew  the  play,  hav- 
ing seen  it  performed  to  perfection  by  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Bancroft  and  their  company; 
and  the  come-down  from  them  to  the  Clap- 
ham  Macreadies  was,  of  course,  tragically 
abrupt.  But,  as  a  critic,  I  naturally  made 
allowance  for  the  gulf  that  was  fixed  be- 
tween professional  and  amateur  acting, 
combined  with  the  differences  between  an 
Assembly  Room  and  a  proper  theatre. 

There  was  much  to  praise;  and  no  doubt 
if  you  are  beginning  to  be  an  actor  your- 
self and  just  finding  out  the  fearful  diffi- 
culties of  the  stage,  it  makes  you  more 
merciful  than  if  you  are  a  critic  who  has 
never  himself  tried  it,  or  knows  in  the 
least  what  it  feels  like.  After  the  third 
act,  the  assistant  acting  manager  came  to 
me  again,  on  his  way  to  others,  and  said  in 
a  hopeful  voice: 


236  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"  Going  strong  —  eh?  " 

"  D'  you  mean  me,  or  the  play? "  I 
asked,  not  in  the  least  intending  a  joke; 
but  he  took  it  for  such  and  evinced  con- 
siderable amusement. 

"  You  '11  be  the  death  of  me,"  he  said. 
^'  You  're  a  born  humourist.  I  expect  I 
should  be  surprised  if  I  knew  your 
name." 

"  Very  likely  you  would,"  I  replied 
guardedly.  But  of  course  I  kept  hidden 
under  the  critical  veil  and  preferred  to 
remain  anonj^mous;  because,  to  have  told 
him  that  my  name  was  merely  Corkey, 
and  that  I  was  a  clerk  in  a  fire  insurance 
office,  would  have  made  him  under-value 
my  criticism;  whereas,  in  reality,  some  of 
the  greatest  critics  of  the  drama  the  world 
has  ever  known,  such  as  Charles  Lamb, 
have  pursued  the  avocation  of  clerk  with 
great  lustre  and  great  honour  to  them- 
selves and  their  employers. 

The  assistant  acting  manager  asked  me 


OF  SEVENTEEN  237 

to  come  behind  after  it  was  over  and  be 
introduced  to  some  of  the  actors  and  ac- 
tresses. He  evidently  observed  that  I  was 
still  in  my  first  youth  and  might  be  dazzled ; 
but  though  I  should  very  much  have  liked 
to  fall  in  with  this  suggestion,  I  felt  that 
my  critical  faculty  might  be  nipped  in  the 
bud,  so  to  speak,  if  I  approached  the  ama- 
teur histrion  in  the  flesh  on  terms  of 
equality. 

Therefore  I  declined,  and  he  hoped  I 
would  "  let  them  all  down  gently,"  to  use 
his  own  expression,  and  I  saw  no  more  of 
him. 

At  the  end  of  the  play  there  was  much 
applause  and  cheering,  and  the  ladies  re- 
ceived bouquets  of  choice  flowers  handed 
up  by  frenzied  admirers;  but  all  this  was, 
of  course,  nothing  to  me.  I  left  the  As- 
sembly Room  and  passed  out  among  the 
audience,  like  one  of  themselves.  Then 
I  walked  all  the  way  home,  in  order  that 
I  might  collect  my  thoughts  and  reach  a 


238  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

judicial  and  impartial  frame  of  mind.  Of 
course  one  must  sometimes  be  cruel  to  be 
kind,  and  so  on;  but  I  felt  in  this  case  that 
it  was  possible,  allowing  for  the  low  ar- 
tistic plane  on  which  amateurs  are  accus- 
tomed to  move,  to  say  some  friendly  and 
encouraging  thing,  accompanied,  of  course, 
by  the  practical  advice  for  which  these 
Clapham  Macreadies  would  naturally  look 
in  the  pages  of  Thespis  when  next  they 
purchased  it. 

My  review  occupied  an  entire  Sunday  in 
writing,  and  I  don't  think  I  overlooked 
anything  or  anybody.  I  began  by  touch- 
ing lightly  on  the  veteran  French  dramatist 
who  was  responsible  for  the  play;  I  then 
alluded  to  the  translation,  and  the  Ban- 
crofts, and  their  reading  of  the  parts,  and 
so  on.  Then,  slowly  but  surely,  I  came  to 
the  Macreadies  and  their  production. 

I  began  with  some  hearty  praise  of  the 
general  performance  and  the  courageous 
spirit  that   had   inspired   the   company   to 


OF  SEVENTEEN  239 

attempt  so  ambitious  an  achievement.  I 
censured  some  of  the  scenery,  but  indi- 
cated how  it  might  have  been  made  better 
with  a  Httle  more  forethought.  The  music 
between  the  acts  I  examined  very  thor- 
oughly and  considered  it  not  well 
chosen. 

I  may  quote  a  passage  or  two,  in 
order  to  show  the  general  nature  of  the 
critique :  — 

"  To  Mr.  Frank  Tottenham  fell  the  part 
of  Count  Orloff,  and  we  may  say  at  once 
that  his  rendition  left  little  to  be  desired. 
His  conception  was  subtle  and  vigorous; 
he  managed  his  limbs  with  a  sound  knowl- 
edge of  stage  deportment,  and  though  his 
elocution  was  faultj^  his  voice  appeared 
well  in  keeping  with  the  character.  His 
make-up,  however,  left  much  to  be  desired. 
There  was  a  lack  of  permanence  about  it, 
and  it  changed  perceptibly  during  the 
course  of  the  play." 

Again  I  submit  another  passage :  — 


240  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

"  Baron  Stein  requires  an  actor  in  ever}'' 
way  out  of  the  common  for  his  adequate 
rendition,  and  if  JNIr.  Rupert  B.  Somervail 
did  not  plumb  the  character  to  the  core 
and  betray  the  secret  springs  that  inspire 
it,  he  none  the  less  submitted  a  consistent 
and  highly  intelligent,  if  rather  tame,  read- 
ing. He  has  considerable  promise,  in  our 
opinion;  and  we  shall  watch  his  future 
progress  with  acute  attention." 

I  took  each  character  in  turn  in  this 
way,  and  found  that,  to  do  real  justice  to 
the  production,  almost  a  whole  number  of 
Thespis  would  be  necessary.  However, 
that,  of  course,  was  not  my  affair.  I  had 
undertaken  to  do  a  thing  for  Mr.  Bulger, 
and  I  did  it  as  well  as  I  could.  The  rest 
I  left  to  him. 

Much  to  my  regret,  he  took  a  very  high- 
handed course  with  my  review,  and  of 
all  the  twelve  pages  of  carefully  written 
foolscap  (not  to  mention  that  I  copied  it 
three   times)    he   only   availed   himself   of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  241 

twelve  lines.  The  analytic  part  he  re- 
morselessly cut  out,  and  the  advice  to  the 
Clai^ham  Macreadies,  and  most  of  the  ad- 
verse criticism.  In  fact,  all  you  would 
have  gathered  from  the  few  commonplace 
paragraphs  that  finally  appeared  was  this: 
that  the  Clapham  Macreadies  had  pro- 
duced Diplomacy,  in  the  interests  of  a 
Cottage  Hospital  somewhere,  and  that 
they  had  given  a  painstaking  and  capable 
performance  before  a  distinguished  and  en- 
thusiastic audience.  The  usual  finish  and 
style  inseparable  from  a  Clapham  Ma- 
cready  production  was  apparent,  the  ladies' 
band  excelled  itself,  and  the  Club  was  to 
be  congratulated  on  adding  another  wreath 
to  its  laurels. 

Of  course,  I  had  said  all  these  things, 
but  not  in  this  bald  and  silly  way.  In 
fact,  I  was  a  good  deal  annoyed,  and 
asked  Brightwin  rather  bitterly  what  Mr. 
Bulger  supposed  I  had  hired  a  suit  of 
dress  clothes  for,  and  gone  down  to  Clap- 


242  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

ham,  and  racked  my  brain  for  twelve  hours 
on  Sunday,  and  so  on;  but  he  assured  me 
that  Mr.  Bulger  had  been  tremendously 
taken  by  my  review  and  considered  that  I 
was  a  born  critic  and  had  really  been  far 
too  conscientious  in  the  matter. 

It  was  my  first  glimpse  behind  the 
scenes  of  the  press  world,  and  I  found 
that  all  that  is  written,  even  by  critics, 
by  no  means  gets  into  print. 

I  felt  in  the  first  pangs  of  disappoint- 
ment that  I  would  never  put  my  pen  to 
paper  again,  and  so  be  lost  to  Mr.  Bulger 
and  Thespis  forever;  but  when  a  week 
or  two  later  he  actually  published  "  The 
Witches'  Sabbath  "  on  the  last  page,  un- 
der the  title  of  "  Original  Poetry,"  I  for- 
gave him  all.  He  had  undoubtedly  tam- 
pered with  "  The  Witches'  Sabbath  "  and 
reduced  the  number  of  the  stanzas;  but  all 
the  best  of  it  was  still  there;  and  in  print 
it  looked  decidedly  literary.  A  great  many 
mistakes  had  unfortunately  crept  into  it; 


OF  SEVENTEEN  243 

and  Mr.  Bulger  had  rather  tampered  with 
the  terror  in  one  or  two  of  the  most  fearful 
verses.  Still,  it  was  mine,  and  as  I  passed 
home  through  London  that  day,  with  a 
copy  of  Thesjns  in  my  pocket,  sent  from 
the  editor,  I  could  not  help  wondering 
how  little  the  hurrying  thousands  guessed 
that,  as  they  carelessly  elbowed  me,  they 
were  touching  a  man  who  had  written 
original  poetry  which  had  been  accepted 
and  printed  in  a  public  newspaper,  and 
might  be  bought  at  any  bookstall  in  Lon- 
don. It  was  rather  a  solemn  thought  in 
its  way,  and  I  stopped  at  a  bookstall  near 
Regent's  Circus  to  prove  it,  and  threw 
down  a  penny  and  asked  for  Thespis. 
Much  to  my  surprise,  however,  the  man 
did  not  keep  it  in  stock. 

"We  could  get  it  for  you,  no  doubt; 
but  I  thought  it  was  dead,"  he  said. 

"  I  can  get  it  for  myself,  if  it  comes  to 
that,"  I  answered,  picking  up  the  penny 
again.      "  You    ought    to    stock    it.      All 


244  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

theatrical  people  buy  it,  and  if  you  thought 
it  was  dead,  you  thought  utterly  wrong. 
It 's  much  more  alive  than  you  are." 

I  then  left  him  hastily,   before  he  had 
time  to  think  of  a  repartee. 


XIII 

MY  efforts  at  the  L.A.C.  threw 
rather  a  cloud  on  my  career  at 
this  season,  for  they  continued  to 
be  crowned  with  failure;  in  fact,  the  bitter 
truth  was  slowly  brought  home  to  me  that 
I  was  not  a  good  runner.  I  won  a  heat 
in  two  handicaps,  after  repeated  losses; 
but  when  it  came  to  the  semi-finals,  in  both 
cases  my  performance  was  quite  beneath 
consideration.  I  was  very  unequal,  and 
Nat  Perry  said  that  my  running  was  rather 
"  in  and  out,"  and  Dicky  Travers  said  that 
it  might  be  misunderstood  and  count  against 
me,  though,  of  course,  he  knew  it  was  not 
intentional,  but  just  according  to  the  sort 
of  spirits  I  was  in.  For  instance,  if  Mr. 
Westonshaugh  had  praised  me  at  the  of- 
fice, or  Mr.  Montgomery  Merridew  had 
said   I   was   getting   on   at   the   Dramatic 


246  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

School,  then,  curiously  enough,  I  ran  bet- 
ter; but  if  Mr.  Westonshaugh  had  frowned, 
or  JMr.  Merridew  had  exhibited  impatience 
about  my  deportment  or  voice  production, 
then  my  legs  seemed  to  feel  it,  and  sulk, 
and  go  slower,  just  when  I  most  wanted 
them  to  go  faster.  Such,  no  doubt,  is  life. 
But,  to  compensate  for  these  reverses, 
most  extraordinary  success  attended  my 
cricket,  and  at  the  end  of  the  season  it  was 
found  on  calculation  that  I  headed  the 
batting  list  with  an  average  of  forty,  deci- 
mal something,  for  eight  completed  innings. 
We  were  the  champion  insurance  office 
that  season,  thanks  in  a  measure  to  me 
and  another  much  better  man  called  Fin- 
lay,  who  bowled  at  a  great  pace  and  was 
also  a  steady  run-getter.  Then  came  the 
striking  news  that  there  was  a  bat  given 
annuall}^  for  the  best  average.  It  was 
bestowed  publicly,  in  the  Board  Room,  and 
the  Secretary  presented  it  in  the  name  of 
the  directors. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  247 

For  an  instant  I  regretted  my  achieve- 
ment; then  I  told  myself  that  as  a  man 
destined  to  take  his  place  on  the  public 
stage  and  be  in  the  public  eye,  a  trifling 
matter  like  a  presentation-bat  was  all  in  the 
day's  work.  So  I  took  the  matter  in  a 
light  spirit,  and,  though  doubtless  many 
felt  very  envious  of  my  amazing  luck,  for 
there  were  five  "  not  outs  "  in  my  average, 
I  none  the  less  treated  it  with  great  ap- 
parent coolness. 

"  You  '11  have  to  make  a  speech,"  said 
Mr.  Blades,  and  I  merely  answered: 

"  Of  course.  You  always  have  to  in 
these  cases  "  —  just  as  though  receiving 
testimonials  was  as  common  a  thing  with 
me  as  registering  policies. 

Behind  the  scenes,  however,  the  case 
was  very  different,  and,  as  the  time  drew 
nearer  for  the  presentation  of  the  bat,  I 
found,  rather  to  my  surprise,  that  my  pulse 
quickened  when  the  thought  came  into  my 
mind. 


248  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

To  quiet  this  effect,  which  was  entirely 
owing  to  the  fact  of  being  unprepared,  I 
planned  a  speech.  Of  course,  a  written 
speech  was  out  of  the  question,  as  only 
monarchs  read  their  speeches,  which  they 
take  from  the  hand  of  a  courtier  at  the 
critical  moment;  but  there  is  no  objection 
to  writing  a  speech  first  and  then  learning 
it  by  heart  and  delivering  it  in  a  slightly 
halting  manner,  as  though  it  was  an  im- 
promptu. This  can  be  done,  and  with  my 
histrionic  attainments  and  increasing  com- 
mand of  deportment  and  voice  production, 
I  felt  hopeful  that  I  should  make  a  good 
impression.  I  felt  my  future  official  career 
might  depend  to  some  extent  on  this  speech, 
and  I  spent  several  evenings  at  home, 
writing  it  and  touching  it  up,  so  that  it 
should  be  worthy  of  the  Apollo  Fire  Office, 
and  of  the  occasion,  and  of  me. 

I  never  polished  anj^thing  so  much  in 
my  life,  and  after  it  was  completed  to  my 
satisfaction  I  tried  it  on  Aunt  Augusta, 


OF  SEVENTEEN  249 

to  see  how  it  struck  her,  as  an  unprejudiced 
person,  ignorant  of  cricket  and  so  on. 

"  You  are  to  imagine  the  Board  Room 
of  the  Apollo  full  of  a  seething  and  serried 
flood  of  officials,"  I  said.  "  The  Secretary, 
the  famous  ^Ir.  Septimus  Trott,  rises  in  his 
chair  and  addresses  the  meeting.  The  af- 
fairs of  the  cricket  club  are  discussed,  and 
its  great  success  during  the  past  season; 
then  he  mentions  me  by  name,  and  very 
likely  a  few  of  my  best  friends  will  raise 
a  cheer.  This  cheer  may  possibly  spread 
to  men  from  the  other  departments,  until 
the  whole  assemblage  honours  me  with  con- 
gratulations. I  don't  say  it  will,  of  course, 
but  it  may.  Then  I  step  out  and  go  up  to 
the  secretarial  chair,  and  Mr.  Septimus 
Trott,  doubtless  with  a  passing  thought  of 
how  very  different  was  the  last  time  I 
came  before  him,  smiles  genially,  picks  up 
the  presentation-bat,  which  I  have  already 
chosen,  and  hands  it  to  me.  He  bows;  I 
bow.     Then  I  accept  the  bat  in  the  true 


250  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

spirit  of  sportsmanship,  and  sjieak  as  fol- 
lows." 

After  that  I  read  my  aunt  the  speech, 
which  was  cast  in  these  memorable  words: 

"  Mr.  Secretary  and  gentlemen,  it  would 
be  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  I  was 
amazed  at  my  performance  as  a  wielder  of 
the  willow  during  our  past  season  on  the 
tented  field.  In  my  earlier  days,  Mr.  Sec- 
retary and  gentlemen,  such  little  success 
as  I  may  claim  for  my  efforts  was  with  the 
leather;  but  I  never  thought  that,  even 
helped  with  such  phenomenal  luck  as  has 
fallen  to  my  share,  I  should  top  our  aver- 
ages and  find  myself  standing  before  you 
in  this  honourable  and  invidious  position." 

*'  Surely  not  '  invidious,' "  said  Aunt 
Augusta;  but  I  held  up  my  hand  for 
silence,  in  the  style  of  Mr.  Merridew 
when  interrupted,  and  proceeded  with  the 
speech. 

"  The  game  of  cricket,  Mr.  Secretary 
and  gentlemen,  is  of  surpassing  antiquity; 


OF  SEVENTEEN  251 

but  it  is  subject  to  those  famous  laws  of 
evolution  discovered  by  JNIr.  Darwin,  and 
it  has  vastly  changed  for  the  better  during 
the  last  half-century.  We  can  hardly 
imagine  that  first-class  cricket  is  capable 
of  further  development;  yet  we  are  wrong. 
It  is.  And  though  I  may  not  be  here  to 
see  it,  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that 
some  of  you  collected  here  to-day  may 
live  to  observe  vast  changes  in  this  historic, 
manly,  and  essentially  English  pastime. 

"  Much  has  already  been  done  since  the 
days  of  Captain  Fellowes  and  Fuller  Pilch 
to  improve  the  national  game;  and  though 
it  is  not  possible  to  us  of  the  Apollo  Fire 
Office,  owing  to  the  many  calls  upon  our 
time  in  this  hive  of  industry,  to  acquire 
what  you  might  consider  perfection  at  what 
has  been  well  called  '  the  King  of  Games,' 
still,  we  have  already  shown  ourselves  to 
be  no  mean  foemen  in  the  fifth  or  sixth- 
class  cricket,  which  we  practise  so  ably,  as 
many  a  victory  over  our  formidable  antag- 


252  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

onists  in  other  insurance  offices  so  clearly 
shows. 

"  That  it  has  been  my  great  good  for- 
tune, Mr.  Secretary  and  gentlemen,  to  ad- 
vance our  prosperity  to  the  flood-tide  of 
success  will  ever  be  a  source  of  proud  grati- 
fication to  me  and  my  family  in  days  to 
come;  and  I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying 
that,  among  mj^  possessions,  be  they  great 
or  small,  in  after  life,  I  shall  cherish  this 
bat  as  a  jewel  in  my  crown,  so  to  say,  and 
never  relinquish  it  as  long  as  my  powers 
enable  me  to  participate  in  our  national 
pastime. 

"  In  conclusion,  Mr.  Secretary  and " 

Here  my  Aunt  Augusta  interposed 
again  —  definitely  and  sternly : 

*'  Really  —  really  —  I  do  think  it 's  too 
long,  my  dear  boy,"  she  said.  "  It 's  aw- 
fully good  and  interesting,  and  flows  beau- 
tifully, and  if  I  was  a  clerk  in  your  office 
I  should  love  to  hear  you  say  it;  but  — 
but " 


OF  SEVENTEEN  253 

"  You  miss  the  elocution  and  the  pauses 
and  effects,"  I  explained.  "  I  'm  merely 
reading  it  now;  but  when  I  deliver  it, 
everything  will  be  quite  different." 

"  It  may  be  so,"  she  said,  "  but  I  have 
a  firm  conviction  that  it  is  far  too  long 
for  the  occasion.  You  see,  after  the  office 
hours  are  over,  the  men  will  all  be  wanting 
to  hurry  off  to  catch  trains,  and  so  on; 
and  it  would  be  a  fearfully  disappointing 
thing  for  you,  in  the  midst  of  your  speech, 
if  people  began  going  out.  Suppose,  as 
an  extreme  case,  that  the  Secretary  him- 
self, who  is  a  very  important  and  busy  man, 
had  to  go  before  you  had  finished?  Think 
what  a  cloud  it  would  cast,  and  how  you 
would  feel." 

Of  course  the  vision  of  the  Secretary 
slipping  away,  and  the  clerks  stealing  out 
one  by  one,  was  a  very  painful  vision;  and 
my  mind  seemed  to  take  hold  of  this  gloomy 
idea  of  Aunt  Augusta's  and  elaborate  it, 
until  I  pictured  a  scene  where  I  and  my 


254  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

bat  were  finally  left  in  the  midst  of  the 
Board  Room  in  solitary  state,  addressing 
the  empty  air! 

"  I  had  n't  looked  at  it  in  that  manner," 
I  told  Aunt  Augusta,  "  and  yet  it  seems  a 
frightful  shame  that  this  thing  should  all 
go  for  nothing." 

"  Could  n't  you  shorten  it  by  about 
three-quarters?"  she  suggested;  but  I  felt, 
somehow,  that  this  was  out  of  the  question. 

"  It  is  a  case  of  all  or  none,  as  we  say," 
I  replied,  "  and  I  am  afraid  it  had  better 
be  a  case  of  none.  I  should  like  to  have 
delivered  the  speech,  and  I  may  tell  you 
that  what  is  called  the  '  per-oration  '  was 
the  best  part  of  it.  I  worked  up  to  a  sort 
of  a  pitch  in  it  —  a  pitch  of  true  feeling. 
In  fact,  it  was  poetry;  and  if  I  had  done 
it  properly,  they  'd  have  forgotten  all  about 
their  trains  and  even  felt  it  was  worth 
missing  them.  But  all  is  now  over.  I 
expect  you  are  right,  though,  of  course, 
it  is  impossible  to  be  certain." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  255 

With  these  words,  I  made  a  quick  move- 
ment and  dramatically  cast  the  manuscript 
of  the  speech  upon  the  fire.  I  thought 
that  Aunt  Augusta,  womanlike,  would 
have  leapt  forward,  smitten  with  remorse 
before  the  spectacle,  and  dashed  at  the 
grate  and  very  likely  burned  herself  in  un- 
availing efforts  to  rescue  my  words.  But 
she  made  no  such  effort,  and  expressed  no 
remorse  whatever.  I  could  not  help  show- 
ing a  little  irritation. 

"  Hang  it  all,"  I  said,  "  you  might  have 
asked  to  hear  the  peroration !  " 

She  put  her  hand  on  my  arm. 

"  I  'm  an  artist  too,"  she  said,  in  her  quiet 
voice,  "  but  I  'm  old,  compared  to  you, 
and  my  sense  of  humour  has  been  sharp- 
ened through  a  good  many  sorrows  as  well 
as  joys.  My  dearest  boj^  it  was  n't  any 
good  —  honestly  —  honestly.  You  can  do 
a  million  times  better  than  that.  Just  say 
what  comes  into  your  head,  and  you  '11 
cover  yourself  with  glory." 


256  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Of  course  the  female  sex  is  famous  for 
a  sort  of  intuition,  and  they  often  get  clever 
and  correct  ideas  without  working  for  them 
like  we  men  have  to  do.  They  have  flashes 
of  sense,  as  it  were,  and  though  sometimes 
the  flashes  are  right  bang  off,  to  use  a  slang 
phrase,  still,  there  is  no  doubt  that  often 
the  things  they  utter  on  the  spur  of  the 
moment  will  be  found  to  hit  the  right  nail 
on  the  head.  Aunt  Augusta  had  sense, 
though  the  worlds  of  the  City  and  of 
sport  were,  naturally,  sealed  books  to  her. 
I  allowed  her  hand  to  stay  on  my  arm, 
which  I  did  not  always  do,  and  granted 
that  I  honestly  believed  she  was  very  likely 
right. 

"  And  if  you  've  had  a  good  many  sor- 
rows in  your  time,  Aunt  Augusta,  I  'm 
very  sorry,  and  don't  wish  to  add  to  them," 
I  said.  "  In  fact,  really,  in  cold  blood, 
looking  back  at  my  idea  of  a  speech,  with 
stage  deportment,  and  elocution,  and  so 
on  —  and  pathos  at  the  end,  it  may  have 


OF  SEVENTEEN  257 

been  infernal  cheek  to  think  of  such  a 
thing  from  a  junior  clerk  to  a  crowd  of 
grown-up  men.  They  might  have  given 
me  '  the  bird,'  which  is  theatrical  parlance 
for  hissing;  they  might  have  got  right- 
down  annoyed,  and  thought  I  was  making 
game  of  them;  they  might  even  have  taken 
away  the  bat !  " 

"  No,"  she  said,  *'  they  would  never  have 
done  anything  like  that ;  but  I  'm  sure 
they  would  have  thought  you  were  making 
too  much  of  the  whole  affair;  and  that 
would  have  hurt  your  feelings." 

So  we  left  it  in  that  way,  and  I  not 
merely  forgave  Aunt  Augusta,  but  thanked 
her  for  saving  me  from  what  might  have 
been  a  considerable  peril  and  very  likely 
damaged  my  future  prospects  in  the 
Apollo. 

When  the  great  evening  actually  did 
come,  only  about  a  dozen  sporting  clerks, 
including  Mr.  Blades  and  Dicky  Travers, 
dropped   in   to   see   the  presentation,   and 


258  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

Mr.  Septimus  Trott,  in  about  six  well- 
chosen  words,  handed  me  my  bat  and  con- 
gratulated me  on  winning  it.  In  return 
I  merely  said:  "Thank  you,  sir.  I'm 
very  glad  to  have  had  such  luck." 

It  was  like  those  rather  dreadful  ac- 
counts of  hangings,  when  you  read  that 
from  the  moment  of  pinioning  till  the  drop 
fell  was  a  period  of  less  than  two  minutes. 
Not  one  of  the  meagre  handful  of  clerks 
who  attended  the  ceremony  need  have 
feared  to  miss  his  train;  and  doubtless  they 
were  well  aware  of  this  before  they  came 
to  the  ceremonial. 

On  the  whole,  I  wasted  a  good  deal  of 
valuable  time  and  thought  on  this  subject, 
and  shall  never  regard  it  as  one  of  the  most 
satisfactory  things  that  happened  to  me 
during  my  first  year  in  London.  In  fact, 
it  was  rather  sad  in  a  way,  though  very 
satisfactory  from  a  purely  sporting  point 
of  view. 


XIV 

JUST  as  my  first  year  in  London  was 
drawing  to  a  close  I  received  the 
gratifying  news  from  Mr.  Weston- 
shaugh  that  I  might  take  a  holiday  of  a 
week's  duration.  Naturally,  my  first  idea 
was  to  go  out  of  town,  and  Aunt  Augusta 
reminded  me  that  Doctor  Dunston  had 
said  he  would  like  to  entertain  me  as  a 
guest  at  Merivale  when  the  opportunity 
offered. 

But,  strangely  enough,  I  did  not  feel 
drawn  to  Merivale,  because  it  so  happened 
that  I  had  seen  the  Doctor  during  the 
previous  spring,  when  he  came  to  London 
to  buy  prizes  and  attend  one  or  two  of 
the  JNIay  meetings,  which  were  his  solitary 
annual  relaxation.  In  fact,  he  had  asked 
me  to  dine  with  him  at  his  hotel,  "  The 
Bishop's  Keys,"  not  far  from  Exeter  Hall, 


260  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

and  I  had  gone,  and  found  the  Doctor 
changed.  I  could  n't  tell  how  he  had 
changed  exactly,  for  he  was  still  the  same 
man,  of  course,  and  still  took  the  same 
majestic  view  of  life;  but  somehow  he  had 
shrunk,  and  seeing  him  at  "  The  Bishop's 
Keys  "  was  quite  different  from  seeing  him 
in  his  study  at  Merivale,  surrounded  by  all 
the  implements  of  the  scholastic  profes- 
sion. His  voice  was  the  same,  and  his  rich 
vocabulary,  and  his  way  of  examining  a 
question  in  all  its  bearings;  but  still,  he 
had  shrunk,  and,  a  good  deal  to  my  sur- 
prise and  uneasiness,  I  found  myself 
actually  disagreeing  with  him!  He  did 
not  thoroughly  realise  what  I  had  become; 
but  that  was  my  own  fault  to  some  extent, 
because  the  old  fascination  under  the 
Doctor's  spell  had  not  entirely  perished, 
and  I  found  myself  feeling  before  him  just 
as  I  used  to  feel.  Of  course  I  ought  to 
have  talked  freely  to  him  and  described 
the  life   I  led  and  the  various   things  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  261 

interest  that  had  happened  to  me  in  Lon- 
don; but  I  did  not.  Instead,  I  listened  to 
him  wandering  on  about  Merivale,  and  the 
new  boys,  and  the  leak  in  the  swimming- 
bath,  and  the  scholarship  his  daughter  had 
got  for  Girton,  and  his  wife's  neuralgia, 
and  his  detection  of  the  gardener's  boy  in 
a  series  of  thefts  from  the  boot-room,  and 
so  on.  He  did  n't  like  London,  and  had  to 
take  lozenges  for  his  throat  every  half- 
hour.  He  was,  in  fact,  not  to  put  too  fine 
a  point  upon  it,  a  bore,  and  though  my 
conscience  stung  me  for  ingratitude,  I 
could  not  throw  myself  into  the  leak  in  the 
swimming-bath,  or  feel  that  the  gardener's 
boy  or  the  scholarship  at  Girton  really 
mattered  an  atom.  It  was  base  on  my 
part,  but  I  could  not  help  it,  and,  curiously 
enough,  my  conversation  had  the  same 
effect  on  the  Doctor  that  his  had  on  me. 
The  only  difference  was  that  he  very  soon 
stopped  me  when  I  began  saying  things 
he   did  n't   like,   whereas    I   could   not,    of 


262  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

course,  stop  him.  Without  saying  it  un- 
kindly, I  found  that  the  Doctor  had  be- 
come rather  piffling  in  his  interests.  He 
gave  me  a  bottle  of  ginger  beer  with  my 
dinner,  while  he  drank  a  half-bottle  of 
burgundy,  and  he  showed  in  a  good  many 
little  ways  that  he  still  regarded  me  merely 
as  Corkey  Major,  and  expected  me  to  re- 
gard him  as  Dr.  Dunston.  But  one  must 
give  and  take  in  these  matters,  and  when 
he  began  talking  about  what  his  old  pupils 
had  done  in  the  world,  and  left  me  entirely 
out  of  the  list  of  those  who  had  made  their 
mark,  I  began  to  feel  fairly  full  up  with 
the  Doctor,  as  they  say,  and  knew  only  too 
well  that  in  future  I  should  manage  to 
struggle  on  without  seeing  any  more  of 
him.  Because  living  in  London  readjusts 
your  perspective,  so  to  speak,  and  it  was 
rather  sad  in  a  way  to  see  such  a  grand 
old  scholar  and  large-minded  man  filling 
up  his  fine  brain  with  such  gew-gaws  and 
fribbles   as   the   affairs   of   Merivale.     He 


OF  SEVENTEEN  263 

was,  moreover,  more  Conservative  than 
ever,  and  I  felt  really  ashamed  to  find 
anybody  with  such  wrong  ideas  on  demand 
and  supply  and  the  rights  of  man.  But  to 
have  corrected  his  opinions  on  these  sub- 
jects would  have  been  an  impossible  task; 
because,  as  Mr.  Blades  once  neatly  said 
on  another  subject,  you  can't  bring  a  back- 
number  up  to  date,  and  the  Doctor,  while 
he  might  have  appeared  to  the  old  ad- 
vantage in  the  scholastic  and  venerable 
atmosphere  of  Merivale,  was  distinctly  of 
the  ancient  and  honourable  order  of  back- 
numbers  as  he  appeared  at  "  The  Bishop's 
Keys  "  in  London. 

There  was  great  unrest  among  the  work- 
ing classes  at  this  time,  and  Dr.  Dunston 
was  very  angry  with  the  proletariat.  "  The 
sons  of  labour,"  he  said,  "  will  soon  be  the 
sons  of  perdition,  for,  at  the  rate  they  are 
going,  they  will  inevitably  dislocate  forever 
the  relations  between  Capital  and  Labour 
—  with    disastrous    results    to    themselves, 


264  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Corkey;  with  disastrous  results  to  them- 
selves! " 

Of  course,  to  one  saturated  in  the  say- 
ings of  Mr.  Bright  and  Mr.  Walter,  these 
views  appeared  erroneous;  but  it  would  not 
have  done  to  tell  the  Doctor  that  I  was 
now  a  Radical.  He  must  have  felt  it  as 
a  personal  slight  in  his  scheme  of  educa- 
tion. Still,  I  had  to  assert  myself  to  some 
extent  and  did  n't  hesitate  to  smoke  a 
cigarette  with  my  coffee.  It  may  be  added 
that  the  Doctor  did  n't  hesitate  to  resent  it. 

"  A  stupid  habit,  even  in  the  adult, 
Corkey,"  he  said;  "and  I  regret  that  you 
have  allowed  yourself  to  acquire  it  at  your 
tender  age.  To  suck  into  the  system  a 
deadening  smoke  from  the  conflagration  of 
a  poisonous  vegetable  has  always  seemed  to 
me  unworthy  of  a  gentleman  and  a  Chris- 
tian. No  doubt  your  companions  have  se- 
duced you,  but  I  am  sorry  the  armour  of 
Merivale  was  not  proof  against  their 
temptation." 


OF  SEVENTEEN  265 

After  this  I  hid  my  secret  flights  toward 
literature  and  the  boards.  His  view  of  the 
theatre  appeared  to  be  that  the  Greek 
drama  was  worthy  of  all  praise,  but  that 
the  English  drama  was  not.  I  asked  him 
if  he  was  going  to  see  Hamlet,  as  per- 
formed by  Mr.  Irving  and  Miss  Ellen 
Terry,  and  he  said,  "  No,  Corkey.  The 
modern  theatre  is  no  place  for  a  preceptor 
of  the  young.  Shakespeare,  in  fact,  is 
far  too  sacred  a  subject  for  the  modern 
stage.  The  spirit  evaporates,  the  poet 
takes  wing,  and  what  is  left  is  not  worth 
going  to  see.  I  read  m}^  Shakespeare  in 
the  privacy  of  my  own  chamber,  Corkey; 
and  I  do  not  expect  that  the  modern  gen- 
eration of  actors  can  teach  me  anything 
I  do  not  already  know  of  the  Swan  of 
Avon,  either  from  a  poetic  or  philosophical 
standpoint." 

To  argue  with  this  sort  of  thing  was,  of 
course,  no  work  for  me.  I  listened  in  si- 
lence,   and    concealed    the    pity    combined 


266  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

with  annoyance  that  was  surging  in  my 
breast.  I  hated  hiding  from  this  religious- 
minded  but  parochial  man  that  I  was  going 
on  the  stage,  for  it  seemed  mean  to  do 
so;  but  I  also  felt  it  was  no  good  putting 
him  to  needless  pain  and  very  likely  spoil- 
ing the  effect  of  the  May  ^leetings  and 
doing  him  harm.  So  I  changed  the  sub- 
ject and  asked  him  about  the  prizes.  He 
had  been  to  the  Army  and  Navy  Stores 
for  these,  and  had  bought  Longfellow's 
Poems,  and  Robinson  Crusoe,  and  St. 
Winifred's,  and  Masterman  Beady,  and 
Hours  with  a  Microscope  and  Hours  with 
a  Telescope,  and  Eyes  and  no  Eyes,  and 
many  another  fine,  old,  crusted  work, 
familiar  enough  to  me  in  the  past.  In 
fact,  I  realised  with  interest  that  the  Doc- 
tor's mind  was  standing  still,  and  though 
there  was  something  grand  in  a  small  way 
to  see  this  steadfast  attitude,  like  a  light- 
house, to  use  a  poetical  simile,  casting  its 
unchanging  beam  over  the  tumultuous  seas 


OF  SEVENTEEN  267 

of  Merivale,  yet,  somehow,  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  the  Strand,  London  (for  "  The 
Bishop's  Keys  "  were  merely  round  a  cor- 
ner from  the  main  thoroughfare),  the  beam 
of  the  Doctor  was  reduced  to  a  mere 
night-hght. 

By  good  luck  he  was  going  to  an  even- 
ing May  Meeting  at  nine  o'clock,  and  he 
invited  me  to  accompany  him  to  hear  an 
eminent  Colonial  Bishop  on  the  Spread  of 
Christianity  in  the  Frigid  Zone;  but  with 
unexpected  courage  I  withstood  him, 
pleaded  an  engagement,  which  was  true, 
as  it  was  a  Dramatic  School  night,  and 
left  him  at  the  threshold  of  Exeter  Hall. 
Our  parting  was  marked  by  a  cordiality 
that  both  of  us  were  far  from  feeling;  for 
I  knew  that  I  had  disappointed  the  Doc- 
tor; and  though,  of  course,  he  little  knew 
that  he  had  disappointed  me,  he  had;  and 
I  felt  an  overpowering  wish  not  to  see  him 
again.  I  had,  in  fact,  now  broken  defi- 
nitely with  my  past,  and  when,  therefore, 


268  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

Aunt  Augusta  suggested  that  my  week's 
holiday  should  be  spent  at  Merivale,  I 
negatived  the  idea  without  a  division,  as 
they  say. 

Aunt  Augusta  then  rose  to  the  occasion, 
with  her  usual  kindness  and  generosity,  and 
proposed  a  few  days  at  a  place  familiar  to 
her  in  Brittany. 

"  It  is  wild  and  lonely,"  she  said,  "  but 
it  is  very  beautiful,  and  I  can  do 
some  sketching  if  the  weather  permits, 
and  you  can  practise  elocution  among 
the  sand  dunes  and  shout  yourself 
hoarse." 

This  offer  of  seeing  a  foreign  country 
was  far  too  good  to  refuse,  and  though 
financially  such  a  thing  was  beyond  my 
private  resources,  I  had  now  made  an  ar- 
rangement with  Aunt  Augusta  by  which 
it  was  definitely  understood  that  any  ad- 
vances which  she  might  be  good  enough 
to  make  for  the  moment  should  be  amply 
recognised  at  a  later  period  in  my  career. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  269 

when  money  ceased  to  be  the  vital  object 
it  was  at  present. 

She  had  not  much,  but  still,  far  more 
than  I,  having  made  a  niche  for  herself 
on  the  pinnacle  of  fame,  and  often  selling 
a  work  of  creative  art  for  eight  or  even  ten 
pounds.  She  promised,  therefore,  that 
when  the  time  came  for  me  to  earn  money 
on  the  boards  and  draw  a  salary  in  keeping 
with  the  dignity  of  a  London  actor,  she 
would  let  me  take  the  financial  lead,  so  to 
speak,  and  richly  reward  her  for  her  gen- 
erosity of  the  past.  In  fact,  it  was  under- 
stood that  if  Aunt  Augusta  cast  her  bread 
upon  the  waters,  in  scrij)tural  language, 
it  would  return  to  her  after  many  days  — 
not  like  the  talent  hidden  in  the  napkin, 
but  more  like  the  widow's  cruse  of  oil,  that 
increased  a  thousand-fold.  I  knew  of 
course  that  this  must  happen,  and  I  think 
she  felt  there  was  more  than  an  off-chance 
of  it.  At  any  rate,  she  went  on  hopefully 
casting. 


270  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

So  we  visited  Brittany,  and  I  enjoyed 
the  interesting  experience  of  a  foreign 
land  and  a  foreign  language  in  my  ears, 
together  with  foreign  food  and  foreign 
money.  A  volume,  of  course,  might  be 
written  about  Brittany,  and,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  manjT^  volumes  have  been;  but  it  is 
not  my  intention  to  say  anything  on  the 
subject  here;  because,  upon  my  return  to 
London,  much  happened  of  a  very  abnor- 
mal character,  and  my  recollection  of  the 
peaceful  days,  when  I  practised  elocution 
in  the  sand  dunes  and  Aunt  Augusta 
painted  pictures  of  the  rather  tame  scen- 
ery, was  speedily  swept  away  to  limbo. 

INIoreover,  I  had  now  reached  within  a 
week  of  my  eighteenth  birthday  and,  by 
a  rather  curious  coincidence,  the  dreadful 
events  now  convulsing  the  metropolis  cul- 
minated on  that  anniversary.  But  I  must 
not  anticipate.  Though  the  proletariat 
was  getting  a  good  deal  out  of  hand  when 
I  came  back  from  France,  no  actual  col- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  271 

lision  had  taken  place  with  Law  and  Or- 
der; but,  to  use  a  well-known  figure  of 
speech,  the  lion  was  aroused  and  roaring, 
though  he  had  not  yet  emerged  from  his 
den.  To  drop  metaphor,  I  may  say  that 
Labour  was  up  in  arms  against  Capital, 
and  Political  Economy  was  at  the  last 
gasp. 

At  this  grave  crisis  I  found  myself 
summoned  once  again  to  assist  our  West- 
End  Branch,  and  then  discovered,  to  my 
astonishment,  that  the  proletariat  had  se- 
lected Trafalgar  Square  as  a  sort  of  rally- 
ing-ground  for  their  forces.  Indeed,  scenes 
of  great  unrest  were  daily  enacted  in  that 
famous  centre  of  civilisation. 

Needless  to  say,  the  staff  at  our  West- 
End  Branch  was  deeply  excited  at  the 
turn  of  affairs,  and  Mr.  Bright  seemed  to 
think  the  j)roblem  the  most  serious  that 
had  arisen  in  politics  for  fifty  years.  He 
was  not,  however,  entirely  on  the  side  of 
the  masses,  but  felt  rather  doubtful  if  their 


272  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

leaders  were  guiding  them  aright.  Mr. 
Walter  never  found  much  time  to  devote 
to  politics,  though  a  sound  Liberal  at  heart; 
but  what  interested  him  was  the  artistic  and 
dramatic  aspect  of  Trafalgar  Square  when 
the  horny-handed  masses  swept  through  it. 
As  for  Mr.  Bewes,  he  went  on  eating  his 
daily  chop  as  though  we  were  not  on  the 
edge  of  a  volcano.  Of  course,  as  a  stern 
Roman  Catholic  he  was  bound  to  believe 
that  all  that  happens  is  for  the  best.  This 
enabled  liim  to  keep  his  nerve  in  a  way 
that  was  a  lesson  to  us. 

Mr.  Harrison,  our  esteemed  chief,  was  a 
Conservative,  and  he  by  no  means  believed 
that  everything  that  happens  is  for  the 
best.  He  heartily  disliked  the  crowds  in 
the  Square  and  was  always  glad  when  the 
time  came  to  close  the  office  and  pull  down 
the  iron  shutters.  The  directors  also,  who 
dropped  in  as  of  yore  to  sign  policies,  took 
a  very  unfavourable  view  of  the  situation 
and  spoke  harshly  of  the  proletariat.    They 


OF  SEVENTEEN  273 

had  a  theory  that  the  leaders  of  the  people 
ought  to  be  hung  for  sedition,  privy  con- 
spiracy, and  other  crimes;  and  the  newly 
made  lord,  known  as  Corrievairacktown, 
said  he  would  like  to  see  the  Guards  called 
out  to  send  the  vermin  back  to  their  holes 
at  the  point  of  the  bayonet.  He  was  a 
very  unbending  man  in  the  matter  of 
Capital  versus  Labour,  and  seemed  to 
think  that  soldiers  was  really  the  last  word 
on  every  subject. 

Then,  after  a  period  of  undoubted  dan- 
ger, there  came  the  terrible  day  when  Mr. 
John  Burns  felt  it  his  duty  to  climb  up  be- 
tween the  Trafalgar  Square  lions  and  wave 
the  republican  flag  of  blood  red  above  a 
sea  of  upturned  faces.  The  air  was  dark 
and  murky;  Nature  wej)t,  so  to  speak,  and 
heavy  clouds  hung  low  above  the  unnum- 
bered thousands  who  listened  with  pant- 
ing bosoms  to  the  impassioned  utterances 
of  their  leader.  Like  trumpet  notes  his 
fiery  syllables  rent  the  welkin,  and  there 


274  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

was  a  movement  in  the  masses  of  the  as- 
sembled hosts,  like  billows  driven  by  the 
wind  over  the  sea.  Their  white  faces  were 
as  foam  on  the  darkness  of  dirty  waves. 

Fired  to  the  fiercest  enthusiasm  by  Mr. 
Burns,  the  proletariat  now  began  to  shout 
and  yell  with  the  accumulated  hunger  and 
frenzy  of  centuries  of  repression,  and  it 
was  evident  to  the  unprejudiced  eye  that 
they  meant  to  make  themselves  respected 
and  get  back  a  little  of  their  own,  as  the 
saying  is.  A  hoarse  and  savage  growl  rent 
the  air,  and  like  hail  the  speaker,  whose 
glittering  eyes  and  black  beard  were  dis- 
tinctly visible  from  the  windows  of  the 
Apollo,  lashed  his  audience  into  a  seething 
whirlpool  of  anarchical  fury.  Here  and 
there  the  populace  seemed  to  start  forward 
on  predatory  thoughts  intent;  then  they 
stood  their  ground  again;  and  there  were 
momentary  intervals  of  silence  in  the  riot, 
like  the  moments  of  silence  in  a  thunder- 
storm.    During  one  of  these  we  distinctly 


OF  SEVENTEEN  275 

heard  a  harsh  and  grating  sound  three 
doors  down  the  street.  It  was  a  jeweler 
putting  up  his  shutters.  In  that  sound  you 
might  say  was  an  allegory,  for  it  typi- 
fied the  idea  of  Capital  funking  Labour. 
A  few  moments  afterwards,  Mr.  Harrison 
himself  stepped  from  his  private  chamber, 
walked  to  the  outer  door,  and  gravely  and 
fearlessly  surveyed  the  ominous  scene. 
The  masses  were  now  out  of  hand,  and 
their  leaders,  probably  much  to  their  own 
surprise  and  regret,  had  awakened  a  storm 
of  unreasoning  ferocity  which  threatened 
to  plunge  the  West  End  into  the  horrors 
of  civil  war.  At  any  rate  Mr.  Harrison 
appeared  to  think  so,  for  after  studying 
the  temper  of  the  crowd,  he  returned  to 
us  and  uttered  these  memorable  words: 

"  Gentlemen,"  he  said,  "  this  is  revolu- 
tion!   Pull  down  the  shutters!" 

Messengers  hastened  to  obey  his  orders, 
and  when  iron  curtains  had  crashed  down 
between  us  and  the  stage  of  this  stupendous 


276  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

spectacle,  we  took  it  in  turn  to  look  out 
through  the  letter-box. 

Mr.  Harrison,  with  all  the  courageous 
instinct  of  a  British  sea-captain,  decided 
not  to  leave  the  Apollo  that  night  unless 
a  great  change  should  come  over  the  spirit 
of  the  scene,  but  for  my  own  part  I  was 
panting  to  rush  out  and  join  the  revolu- 
tion —  not  with  a  view  to  assist  it  in  any 
nefarious  project,  but  to  study  it  from  the 
artistic  standpoint.  Before  I  could  start, 
however,  the  ferocious  crowds  had  split 
up  and  swept  in  different  directions.  They 
went  towards  the  west  chiefly,  and  bursting 
in  upon  defenseless  streets,  that  had  not 
heard  what  was  going  on,  surprised  them 
painfully  and  helped  themselves  from  the 
shops  before  their  proprietors  could  arrest 
their  onslaught.  I  came  upon  the  people 
presently  —  to  find  them  very  far  removed 
from  what  you  might  call  a  conciliatory 
attitude. 


XV 

THERE  is  nothing  like  personal 
contact  with  a  thing  to  make  you 
understand  its  reality,  and  when 
the  revolution  knocked  my  hat  off  into  the 
road  I  felt  myself  faced  with  no  idle 
dream.  There  was  something  about  the 
top-hat  of  the  common  or  garden  clerk 
that  angered  the  revolutionists,  and  they 
did  not  seem  to  recognise  in  me  a  toiler 
like  themselves.  Yet  the  only  difference  was 
that  I  worked  a  jolly  sight  harder  than  most 
of  them,  and  they  little  knew  that  at  that 
moment  I  was  hurrying  about  among  them 
simply  to  take  mental  notes  in  a  highly 
sympathetic  and  artistic  spirit.  Mine  was 
not  the  only  top-hat  that  roused  their  ire; 
in  fact,  they  regarded  this  hateful  but  hon- 
ourable head-covering  as  an  embodiment  of 
Capital;    therefore    they    knocked    it    off 


278  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

whenever  they  saw  it  among  them.  Le- 
gally this  was  assault,  if  not  battery, 
but  they  cared  nothing  for  that,  and  in 
another  and  more  ferocious  sort  of  up- 
heaval, no  doubt,  they  would  have  knocked 
off  the  heads  under  the  hats  as  well  as  the 
hats  themselves.  This,  however,  they  did 
not  do;  in  fact,  the  revolution,  taken 
piecemeal,  which  is  the  only  way  a  single 
pedestrian  can  take  it,  was  an  utter  coward, 
for  at  the  word  "  copper,"  whole  gangs  of 
twenty  or  thirty  men  would  evaporate, 
onlj^  to  form  again  as  soon  as  the  guard- 
ians of  the  peace  had  disappeared.  Such, 
indeed,  was  the  celerity  of  the  revolution 
when  threatened  with  the  law,  that  again 
and  again  the  police  charged  thin  air. 
Doubtless  this  was  the  result  of  hunger, 
for  had  the  people  been  well  fed,  they 
would  have  been  braver.  But,  of  course, 
if  they  had  been  well  fed,  they  would  not 
have  revolted.  In  fact,  a  revolution  is  a 
very  good  example  of  cause  and  effect. 


OF  SEVENTEEN  279 

My  top-hat  was  knocked  off  for  the 
third  time  in  Oxford  Street,  and  at  the 
same  moment  somebody  grabbed  at  my 
watch-chain  and  tried  to  possess  themselves 
of  my  "  Waterbury."  In  fact,  the  top- 
hat  was  really  a  source  of  danger,  and,  at 
the  third  loss,  I  ignored  the  hat,  now  much 
the  worse  for  wear,  and  left  it  for  the 
younger  members  of  the  revolution  to  play 
football  with.  I  then  went  on  bareheaded, 
until  reaching  a  small  shop  in  a  back  street 
that  had  not  been  penetrated  by  the  mob. 
Here  I  purchased  a  cloth  cap  of  dingy 
appearance  and  a  brown  muffler,  and,  thus 
accoutered,  I  plunged  into  the  fray  once 
more. 

The  men  in  Oxford  Street  were  armed 
with  stones,  and  when  a  private  carriage 
passed  down  the  way,  they  broke  the  win- 
dows. The  hansom,  the  harmless  four- 
wheeler,  and  the  groaning  omnibus  they 
did  not  molest;  but  a  private  carriage 
awoke    their     worst     passions,     and     they 


280  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

smashed  the  windows,  utterly  regardless  of 
the  harm  they  might  be  doing  to  the  occu- 
pant —  fair  or  otherwise. 

Disguised  as  one  of  themselves  with  the 
cap  and  muffler,  I  was  no  further  molested, 
and  spent  an  hour  or  two  among  the  peo- 
ple, to  find  that,  as  the  day  advanced,  they 
began  to  cool  down.  It  seemed  as  if  the 
fever  of  battle  was  burning  itself  out,  and 
when  there  rose  a  rumour  that  the  troops 
had  been  called  into  the  streets  to  help 
the  police,  a  great  change  came  o'er  the 
spirit  of  the  scene.  The  revolution  hated 
to  hear  about  the  soldiers,  because,  of 
course,  it  was  by  no  means  ready  for  any 
such  violent  measures.  In  fact,  so  far  as 
I  was  concerned,  the  incident  was  now  at 
an  end,  and  I  returned  home  to  Aunt 
Augusta  full  of  my  great  intelligence.  She 
had  been  painting  rather  industriously  all 
day  and  had  heard  nothing  of  the  peril  that 
had  threatened  the  metropolis.  We  talked 
a  great  deal  about  it,  and  she  much  re- 


OF  SEVENTEEN  281 

gretted  my  top-hat  and  the  events  that  had 
led  to  its  destruction;  but,  womanlike,  a 
little  personal  trifle  interested  her  far  more 
than  the  calamity  that  promised  to  shake 
the  forces  of  Capital  and  Labour  to  the 
core,  and  very  likely  convulse  the  civilised 
world;  and  this  was  the  trifling  accident  of 
my  birthday. 

I  was,  in  fact,  eighteen,  and  Aunt  Au- 
gusta had  already  wished  me  many  happy 
returns  of  the  day  and  given  me  a  present 
of  an  original  and  very  beautiful  water- 
colour  drawing  of  the  Thames  at  West- 
minster. But  now  she  returned  to  the 
subject,  though  I  tried  to  choke  her  off  it 
and  explained  that  after  one  reaches  man's 
estate  these  accidental  anniversaries  are 
better  forgotten. 

"  If  you  don't  remember  anything  that 
does  n't  matter,"  I  said  to  her,  "  then  you 
have  all  the  more  room  in  your  memory 
for  everything  that  does," 

But  she  insisted  on  making  a  stir  about 


282  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

my  natal  da}^  and  since  London  was  too 
unsettled,  in  her  opinion,  to  go  to  a  theatre, 
she  decided  to  have  a  lively  evening  at 
home,  beginning  with  a  dinner  of  unusual 
variet)^  and  style.  She  was  rather  a  classy 
cook  and  had  learned  the  science  when  an 
art  student  in  Paris;  so  she  sent  out  Jane 
to  get  supplies,  and  asked  me  if  I  thought 
I  could  venture  out,  too,  and  buy  a  bottle 
of  champagne.  I  felt  secretly  that,  owing 
to  the  hunger  and  so  on  of  the  masses, 
one  ought  not  to  be  drinking  champagne 
on  a  night  like  this.  It  was  that  sort  of 
callous  indifference  that  caused  the  French 
Revolution,  and  I  told  Aunt  Augusta  that 
if  the  proletariat  knew  what  she  and  I 
were  up  to,  they  might  very  likely  swoop 
upon  her  flat  and  ransack  it,  or  set  it  on 
fire.  But  she  answered,  very  truly,  that 
the  proletariat  would  not  know,  and  as  to 
have  argued  further  would  have  laid  me 
imder  suspicion  of  cowardice,  I  went  out 
to  buy  the  sparkling  beverage  and  bring 


OF  SEVENTEEN  283 

it  home.  Luckily  for  the  banquet,  Aunt 
Augusta  had  received  rather  a  swagger 
commission  for  four  of  her  etchings  the  day 
before,  and  so  she  was  out  of  sympathy 
with  the  sufferings  of  the  people  and  in 
sympathy  with  the  anniversary  of  my 
birth. 

We  had  a  great  time  in  a  gastronomic 
sense.  The  meal  embraced  mock-turtle 
soup,  an  omelette  with  herbs  chopped  up 
in  it,  a  pheasant  and  chipped  potatoes,  an 
apple  tart  and  tinned  apricots,  anchovies 
on  toast,  pears,  and  a  pineapple  —  all,  of 
course,  washed  down  with  the  juice  of  the 
grape  and  coffee. 

Champagne  is  a  most  hopeful  wine,  which 
you  can  have  sweet  or  dry,  and  after  drink- 
ing a  full  glass,  I  began  to  suggest  plans 
for  improving  the  state  of  the  proletariat, 
accompanied  by  a  suspicion  that  their  con- 
dition was  not  so  bad  as  they  wanted 
us  to  think.  I  talked  a  great  deal  to 
Aunt    Augusta,     and     smoked     a     whole 


284  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

packet  of  cigarettes.  She  also  smoked 
and  drank  her  coffee  and  listened  to  me 
intently. 

Presently,  I  began  to  discuss  myself  and 
my  career,  and  thanked  her  very  heartily 
for  helping  it  forward  to  the  best  of  her 
power,  as  she  was  doing. 

She  was  kind  enough  to  say  that  I  had 
brought  a  great  deal  of  pleasure  into  her 
life,  and  she  did  n't  know  what  she  would 
do  without  me  when  I  started  rooms  on  my 
own  account.  I  allayed  her  fears  in  this 
matter  and  promised  I  would  not  leave  her 
for  at  least  another  year. 

*'  From  eighteen  till  nineteen  you  may 
count  upon  me,"  I  said,  "  though  after 
another  year  has  passed,  I  don't  know  what 
may  happen,  because  life  is  so  full  of  sur- 
prises." 

I  then  retraced  the  year,  from  the  day 
that  Doctor  Dunston  had  sent  for  me  to 
see  him  and  I  thought  it  was  fireworks,  up 
to  the  present  moment  in  the  throes  of  the 


OF  SEVENTEEN  285 

revolution.  It  seemed  almost  impossible 
that  so  much  could  happen  in  the  time ;  and 
as  I  smoked  and  indulged  in  a  retrospect, 
as  the  saying  is,  I  felt  that  the  battle  of  life 
had  been  fought  almost  day  and  night.  It 
had  not  yet  been  won,  exactly,  but  there 
seemed  fair  reason  to  expect  that  with  luck 
it  soon  would  be. 

In  fact,  the  champagne  made  me  de- 
cidedly too  pleased  with  all  I  had  done,  and 
I  believe,  if  the  truth  could  have  been 
known,  that  I  talked  rather  big  to  Aunt 
Augusta  and  was  on  better  terms  with  my- 
self than  the  occasion  demanded. 

I  began  to  sketch  out  my  programme  of 
life  for  my  eighteenth  year,  and  there  is  no 
doubt  that  it  was  too  ambitious.  At  any 
rate.  Aunt  Augusta  evidently  felt  that  I 
was  planning  more  than  I  could  perform, 
and  she  turned  my  thoughts  into  another 
channel. 

"  Of  course  all  sorts  of  delightful  new 
things  will  happen  to  you,"  she  said,  "  but 


286  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

it  would  be  a  pity  to  forget  the  adventures 
you  have  already  had." 

"  I  shall  never  forget  them,"  I  assured 
her;  but  she  told  me  that  memory  played 
tricks  with  the  wisest  people,  and  strongly 
advised  me  to  spend  some  few  spare  even- 
ings in  writing  a  diary  of  the  past,  while 
it  was  fresh  in  mind. 

"  It  would  be  of  great  help  to  your  next 
brother,"  she  told  me.  "  He  '11  be  coming 
to  London  from  Merivale  in  another  eight- 
een months  or  so,  and  he  'd  love  to  hear  all 
that  has  happened  to  you." 

In  fact.  Aunt  Augusta  openly  advised  a 
diary  founded  upon  the  past,  and  though 
my  feeling  is  always  to  let  the  past  bury 
the  past  and  be  pushing  forward  to  fresh 
fields  and  pastures  new,  as  the  poet  has  it, 
still,  there  are  many  people  —  generally  of 
the  female  sex  —  who  take  a  great  interest 
in  looking  back  to  the  time  when  they  were 
younger,  and  mourning  their  golden  prime 
—  though  it  probably  was  n't  half  as  golden 


OF  SEVENTEEN  287 

really  as  it  seems  to  them,  looking  back  at 
it.  Therefore,  solely  to  please  my  Aunt 
Augusta,  I  fell  in  with  this  suggestion  and 
allowed  myself  to  retrace  my  first  wavering 
steps  in  the  worlds  of  art  and  finance. 

I  set  down  the  bare,  unvarnished  tale  and 
told  the  simple  truth  as  far  as  I  could  re- 
member it.  I  preserved  the  aloof  attitude 
of  the  born  raconteur,  and  allowed  my 
dramatis  personw  to  flit  across  the  page  in 
the  habit  in  which  they  lived.  I  don't  think 
I  forgot  anybody,  and  tried  to  deal  im- 
partially with  them  all.  I  told  of  my  dinner 
with  Mr.  Pepys  and  his  sister,  of  the  offi- 
cial life,  enriched  with  the  ripe  humanity 
of  Mr.  Westonshaugh,  the  generous  friend- 
ship of  Mr.  Blades  and  the  various  char- 
acteristics of  Dicky  Travers,  the  hero  of  the 
L.A.C. ;  Bassett,  the  martial;  Wardle,  the 
musical;  Tomlinson,  the  equine;  and  Bent, 
the  horticultural.  I  told  of  my  experiences 
with  the  shady  customer,  and  on  the  cinder- 
path  and  the  cricket-field.     I  retraced  my 


288  FROM  THE  ANGLE 

approach  to  the  drama,  and  the  grey-eyed 
girl,  and  Brightwin,  and  Mr.  Smith,  and 
the  others,  crowned  by  the  soaring  figure  of 
Mr.  ISIontgomery  JNIerridew. 

Then  I  chronicled  the  glad  hour  when  I 
repaired  to  our  West-End  Branch  and  was 
lifted  to  the  friendship  of  Mr.  Walter  and 
Mr.  Bright;  and  lastly,  I  set  down  my 
earliest  experience  on  the  paths  of  litera- 
ture, in  connection  with  tragic  poetry  and 
dramatic  criticism. 

By  a  happy  thought,  I  presented  the 
manuscript  of  this  "  crowded  hour  of  glo- 
rious life,"  as  the  poet  has  it,  to  Aunt 
Augusta  on  her  own  birthday.  In  fact, 
the  thirty-eighth  anniversary  of  that  aus- 
picious event  was  gladdened  for  her  by  the 
gift  of  my  diary. 

I  rejoice  to  say  that  it  afforded  her 
pleasure,  but  regret  to  add  that  it  was  not 
the  sort  of  pleasure  I  intended. 

"  Life,  from  the  angle  of  seventeen,  is  so 
dreadfully  funny  —  seen  from  the  angle  of 


OF  SEVENTEEN  289 

thirty-eight,"  she  assured  me  —  though  why 
it  should  be  "  funny  "  she  was  not  appar- 
ently able  to  explain. 

"  It  may  be  interesting,  but  I  don't  see 
anything  particularly  funny  about  it,  Aunt 
Augusta,"  I  answered,  slightly  hurt  at  the 
adjective. 

She  did  not  attempt  to  argue,  but  con- 
tinued : 

"  You  must  promise  me  to  write  your 
eighteenth  year,  too,"  she  said.  "  It  will 
be  something  for  your  old  aunt  to  look  for- 
ward to.    You  must  promise  faithfully." 

"  That  depends,"  I  answered  rather 
coldly.  *'  Life  is  life,  and  I  find  it  a  serious 
thing,  though  it  may  seem  '  dreadfully 
funny  *  to  you,  Aunt  Augusta.  Anyhow, 
funny  or  not  funny,  I  shall  not  butcher  my 
eighteenth  year  to  make  a  Roman  holiday, 
as  they  say.  Important  things  must  hap- 
pen to  me  in  my  eighteenth  year.  Nobody 
can  get  through  their  eighteenth  year  with- 
out important  events;  but  if  you  think " 


290  THE  ANGLE  OF  SEVENTEEN 

"  Forgive  me,"  she  said.  "  I  did  n't  mean 
it  for  a  moment.  It 's  a  lovely  diary,  and 
I  shall  always  treasure  it,  and  I  would  n't 
have  a  word  altered  —  and  it 's  my  birth- 
day, so  you  must  n't  be  cross." 

Well,  I  forgave  her ;  because  she  's  really 
a  jolly  old  thing,  and  of  the  greatest  assist- 
ance to  me  behind  the  scenes,  so  to  speak. 
Besides,  everybody  knows  that  the  feminine 
sense  of  humour  is  merely  dust  and  ashes. 
No  doubt,  if  I  had  written  with  badinage 
or  pleasantry,  in  a  light  and  transient  vein, 
enlivened  by  sparks  of  persiflage  and  bur- 
lesque, she  would  have  taken  it  in  a  tearful 
spirit  and  cried  over  it. 

But  only  a  woman  can  laugh  at  the 
naked  truth;  men  know  it's  a  jolly  sight 
too  serious.  To  laugh  at  my  diary  was  the 
act  of  the  same  woman  who  drank  cham- 
pagne on  the  night  of  the  revolution.  We 
must  remember  that  they  are  not  as  we  are, 
and  treat  them  accordingly. 

THE   END 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

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